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 Towo and Neigbboyrbood 
 
 Witi 
 
 .
 
 THE LIBRARY 
 
 OF 
 
 THE UNIVERSITY 
 OF CALIFORNIA 
 
 LOS ANGELES
 
 LUDLOW 
 
 TOWN AND NEIGHBOURHOOD.
 
 LUDLOW 
 
 Town and Neighbourhood. 
 
 A SERIES OF SKETCHES OF ITS SCENERY. 
 
 ANTIQUITIES, GEOLOGY, ETC., DRAWN & DESCRIBED 
 
 IN PEN AND INK. 
 
 BY 
 
 OLIVER BAKER, 
 
 FELLOW OF THE ROYAL SOCIETY OF PAINTER-ETCHERS (LONDON) 
 MEMBER OF THE ROYAL SOCIETY OF ARTISTS (BIRMINGHAM) 
 
 WITH ILLUSTRATIONS IN F AC-SI MILE 
 FROM SKETCHES HY THE AUTHOR. 
 
 Third Edition. 
 
 LONDON : SIMPKIN, MARSHALL & Co. 
 
 LUDLOW : 
 
 G. WOOLLEY, 42, BULL RING. 
 1906. 
 
 [ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.]
 
 AUTHOR'S PREFACE TO 1888 EDITION. 
 
 SOME few years ago, whilst making additions to Wright's 
 " Ludlow Guide " for Mr. Woolley, I undertook at his 
 request to write and illustrate a more ambitious work, 
 which has eventually taken the shape of the present volume. 
 Its general plan was adopted, for the sake of brevity and 
 to avoid the tedious repetitions to which topographical 
 books are so liable. The purely historical portion has been 
 only slightly treated, for several reasons. The documents 
 which would have been essential to a serious historical 
 treatise are bulky and numerous ; it would have been easy 
 to fill the book, or a much larger one, with deeds, charters, 
 and churchwardens' accounts ; but apart from the diffi- 
 culties as to space, they would have been to some extent out 
 of place in a popular work. Many of these have been 
 already published, and I have met people who collected 
 them but never anyone who read them. 
 
 There was not much room, therefore, for original research 
 in the historical branch of the subject, except where it was 
 possible, by the examination of existing buildings, to throw 
 light on their past, as for instance in the case of Bromfield 
 Priory, in which important events at and subsequent to the 
 Reformation are traced from the existing remains, appar- 
 ently for the first time. This was a field which had remained 
 comparatively untouched. I regret that in the case of 
 the Guild College, I discovered the most interesting remains 
 too late to insert more than a very slight notice of them. 
 The large fourteenth-century window at the back of Church 
 Street (which has low transoms and wooden shutters, 
 showing it to be domestic work) would have been worth 
 describing in detail. 
 
 884.^78
 
 In conclusion, I have to ask the indulgence of those who 
 may think the point of view I have taken that of the 
 sketcher and the archaeologist an unpractical one. It is 
 not so in reality. The fact is, that stronger language 
 than mine might be used in condemnation of the 
 heedless vandalism which in some cases is robbing us of 
 our lawful heritage. This is sometimes done by people who 
 have no excuse for not knowing better, under the plea of 
 "' restoration," which often amounts to actual rebuilding. 
 
 I have to acknowledge kind und valuable help from 
 many friends who showed an interest in the work I under- 
 took ; and especially to Miss E. Smith of Ludford, Mr. 
 Edwin Smith, and the late R. K. Penson, Esq., my thanks 
 are due ; also to the Rev. J. D. La Touche for looking 
 over the geological chapter. 
 
 O.B. 
 
 EDGBASTON, 1888.
 
 PUBLISHER'S PREFACE TO 1906 EDITION. 
 
 The aim of this work is to present in a popular and 
 readable shape an accurate account of the Ludlow district, 
 and of the objects of historical interest with which it 
 abounds. 
 
 In entrusting it to Mr. Oliver Baker, I felt that his 
 artistic and archaeological qualifications, and his intimate 
 acquaintance with the locality, well fit him for the task of 
 dealing with a neighbourhood whose claim to attention 
 rests so completely on its scenery and antiquities. 
 
 The Pictorial Illustrations form an important feature, 
 Mr. Baker having made sixty-seven special sketches for 
 them, which have been reproduced in fac-simile by the 
 eminent process-engravers, the Typographic Etching Com- 
 pany, of London. 
 
 If it reveals " the rich mine of good things " that 
 " Ludlow and its Neighbourhood " is "to the Antiquary, 
 Artist, Amateur Photographer, Naturalist, Geologist, Lover 
 of Nature, and the jaded man of business," in far wider 
 circles than hitherto, my ambition and aim in publishing 
 this volume describing in " black-and-white " one of the 
 most interesting and picturesque towns and localities in 
 England, will find ample reward. 
 
 The 4to Subscription edition published in 1888, and the 
 8vo edition of 1889, have been out of print for some 
 time. To meet the demand for copies by the public, 
 I have reprinted the edition of 1889, with all the original 
 illustrations. I heartily thank the Press and the Public 
 for so kindly receiving the previous editions, and trust in 
 this more handy size it will still enjoy the appreciation of 
 the touring public. 
 
 CORVE ST., LUDLOW, 
 August, 1906.
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 PAGE. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 INTRODUCTORY I 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 THE CASTLE : ITS EXTERIOR AND HISTORY. 
 
 First Aspect Outer Walls Sally-port Beacon Tower Ex- 
 ternal Walks Gateway Its Origin Leland's Account of 
 the Fitzwarine Romance Its Castellans The Barons' War 
 Its Occupation by the Mortimers By Richard Plantage- 
 net Sacked by the Lancastrians Restored by Edward IV. 
 Prince Arthur Court of Marches The Lords President 
 "Comus " " Hudibras " Parliamentary Siege Decay 4 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 INTERIOR OF THE CASTLE. 
 
 The Outer Ward Barracks Mortimer's Tower Bridge and 
 Inner Gate The Inner Ward Norman Keep Other Nor- 
 man Work Round Chapel Prince Arthur's Room Great 
 Hall State Apartments . . . . . 1 5 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 THE PARISH CHURCH. 
 
 Its Situation South Side First Impression Scene from 
 Churchyard Its History Interior Hexagonal Porch 
 Nave Arcades Aisles Rood Loft Collegiate Stalls 
 Miserere Carvings The Lady-Chapel Its Screen The 
 Font St. John's Chapel Its Screen and Fittings Ancient 
 Glass The Chancel Vestry Sedilia Reredos Treasure 
 Chamber Monuments . . . . . . .23 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 THE TOWN. 
 
 Remains of the Monasteries The College The Grammar School 
 Barnaby House Dinham Chapel The Town Wall 
 Broad Gate Gaol Butter Cross Corporation Maces 
 Civic Buildings Domestic Architecture Almshouses 
 The Museum ... . . . . . . 48
 
 11. 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 LUDFORD. 
 
 Ludford Bridge Village Church Monuments to the Foxes 
 and Charltons Ludford House St. Giles's Almshouse 
 Whitcliff . 63 
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 SURROUNDING DISTRICT. 
 
 Introductory ......... 74 
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 WALK TO RICHARD'S CASTLE. 
 
 Huck's Barn Overton Sunny Gutter Moor Park Haye 
 Woods Batchcott The Castle Mound and Ruins Clark's 
 Account Church Boney Well Court House and Dove- 
 cote .......... ?6 
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 
 WALK TO BROMFIELD, THROUGH OAKLY PARK. 
 
 Views of Castle Prior's Halton Oakly Park Bromfield 
 
 Bridge Priory Village Burway . . . . 83 
 
 CHAPTER X. 
 
 WALK TO ORELTON, THROUGH ASHFORD, WOOFFERTON, ETC. 
 
 Overton Lodge Ashford Hall Mill Ashford Carbonell Ash- 
 ford Bowdler Woofferton Comberton Orleton Court 
 Church 90 
 
 CHAPTER XL 
 
 WALK TO STEVENTON. 
 
 The River-side Fold Gate Steven ton 95 
 
 CHAPTER XII. 
 
 DRIVE THROUGH WIGMORE, LEINTWARDINE, DOWNTON, ETC. 
 
 Whitcliff Woods Mary Knowl Comus Valley (Sunny Gutter) 
 Pipe Aston Elton Leinthall Starkes Wigmore 
 Church Castle The Mortimers Abbey Leintwardine 
 Downton-on-the-Rock Limestone Gorge Downton 
 Castle Clungunford ....... 97
 
 111. 
 
 CHAPTER XIII. 
 
 DRIVE THROUGH WIGMORE TO AYMESTREY, KINGSLAND, ETC. 
 
 Wigmore Hall Deerfold Forest Leinthall Earles Croft 
 Arnbrey Gatley Park Aymestrey Mortimer's Cross 
 Shobdon Court Priory Village Kingsland Eyton 
 Yarpole Luc ton Croft Castle -Church Bircher . .no 
 
 CHAPTER XIV. 
 
 DRIVE THROUGH STOKE ST. MILBOROUGH TO BROWN CLEE, 
 TITTERSTONE, ETC. 
 
 Rock Green Dodmore Middleton Crow Leasowe Ascent 
 of Titterstone The Moor Stoke St. Milborough Cold 
 Weston Brown Clee Bouldon Heath Chapel Peaton 
 Corfham Castle Button 121 
 
 CHAPTER XV. 
 
 DRIVE THROUGH CORVE DALE. 
 
 Corve Bridge Site of Norman Chapel Tumuli on Oldfield 
 Stan ton Lacy Saxon Work Churchyard Tombs Vil- 
 lage Manor-house The Lacys Culmington Elsich 
 Delbury Holgate, &c. Munslow Upper Millichope . 129 
 
 CHAPTER XVI. 
 
 DRIVE THROUGH ASHFORD, CAYNHAM, WHITTON, WHITTON COURT, ETC. 
 
 Ashford House Caynham Court Camp Church Whitton 
 Court Whitton Chapel Hope Bagot Bitterley Church 
 Henley Hall .138 
 
 CHAPTER XVII. 
 
 RAILWAY EXCURSION TO STOKESAY. 
 
 River Onny Onibury Craven Arms Newton Stokesay 
 
 Castle Its History Stokesay Church .... 144 
 
 CHAPTER XVIII. 
 
 RAILWAY EXCURSION TO TENBURY. AND WALKS TO BURFORD. ETC. 
 
 Woofferton Easton Court Little Hereford Nunupton Up- 
 ton Court Middleton-on-the-Hill Brimfield Tenbury 
 Church Tombs St. Michael's Burford Tombs Knigh- 
 ton-on-Teme . . . . . . . . 154 
 
 CHAPTER XIX. 
 
 GEOLOGY OF THE NEIGHBOURHOOD ..... 163
 
 ILLUSTRATIONS. 
 
 PAGE 
 
 Doorway to Norman Chapel, Ludlow Castle .... I 
 
 The Butter Cross, from a side street, Ludlow .... 2 
 
 Ancient Corporate Seal, Ludlow ...... 3 
 
 Ludlow Castle, from the North ...... 4 
 
 Castle, from the River above Ludlow ..... 7 
 
 The Keep and Inner Moat, Ludlow Castle. (By the late Harry 
 
 Baker) 16 
 
 Gateway to Inner Ward, Ludlow Castle. . . . .17 
 
 Doorway to Keep, Ludlow Castle . . . . . 19 
 
 Ground Plan of Ludlow Castle . . . . . .21 
 
 Ludlow Castle, from the Meadows . . . . . .22 
 
 Parish Church and Old House in Churchyard . . . .24 
 
 Doorway to Old House in Churchyard . . . . .26 
 
 Rood Screen and Stalls, Ludlow Church . . . .30 
 
 Miserere Carving, Ludlow Church . . . . . .32 
 
 Screen of the Lady-Chapel, and South Transept, Ludlow Church 37 
 Sedilia and Piscina, Ludlow Church . . . . -39 
 
 Easter Sepulchre and Towneshend Tomb, Ludlow Church . 43 
 Plan of the Town, showing the Old Wall . . . . 4- 
 
 The Grammar School, from Mill Street, Ludlow . . -52 
 
 The Broad Gate, Ludlow 55 
 
 Ludlow " Corporation Insignia " . . . . . -57 
 
 The Feathers Hotel, Ludlow . . . .' . 58 
 
 Arms in Lane's Hospital, Ludlow . . . . . .62 
 
 Ludford Bridge, from the foot of Whitcliff . . . .63 
 
 Ludford Bridge from below ....... 64 
 
 The Teme from the Whitcliff Quarries . . . . .66 
 
 Porch of Oratory, Ludford House . . . . .70 
 
 The Old Bell Inn, Ludford 71 
 
 The Teme under Whitcliff 72 
 
 The Bull Inn Yard, Ludlow 73 
 
 Norman Font, Holgate ....... 74
 
 V. 
 
 Richard's Castle Church ........ 78 
 
 Porch, Richard's Castle Church ...... 80 
 
 The Court House, and Dove-cote, Richard's Castle . . .81 
 
 Druid Oaks, Oakly Park 83 
 
 Bromfield Priory from the River . . . . . .85 
 
 Priory Gate House, Bromfield . . . . . .87 
 
 Gateway, Bromfield Priory, from the Road . . . .89 
 
 Vesica Window and Norman Lights, Ashford Carbonell Church 9 1 
 Churchyard Cross at Orleton ...... 92 
 
 Pulpit and Chancel Arch, Orleton. . . . . -93 
 
 Cottage at Leinthall Starkes. ...... 94 
 
 Old Fireplace, Steventon ....... 96 
 
 Norman Tympanum, Pipe Aston. (From Wright's " History 
 
 ofLudlow") ........ 98 
 
 Wigmore, from the Park ....... 99 
 
 Gatehouse to Wigmore Abbey . . . . . .102 
 
 The Teme at Downton . ....... 107 
 
 Croft Castle . . . . . . . . .119 
 
 Dodmore . . . . . . . . . .122 
 
 The Heath Chapel. (From Wright's " History of Ludlow ") 125 
 Interior of the Heath Chapel. ,, ..... 126 
 
 Saxon Doorway at Stan ton Lacy . . . . . .128 
 
 Tombs of the Lacys, Stanton Lacy . . . . .130 
 
 Culmington Church . . . . . . . .133 
 
 Elsich Manor House . . . . . . . -135 
 
 Old Sun-dial, Munslow . . . . . . .137 
 
 Triple Arch, Caynham Church . . . . . '139 
 
 Whitton Court ......... 140 
 
 Churchyard Cross, Bitterley. . . . . . .142 
 
 Norman Font, Bitterley . . . . . .143 
 
 Stokesay Castle and Church. . . . . . .145 
 
 Stokesay Castle from the Churchyard . . . . .146 
 
 Doorway of Great Hall, Stokseay ...... 148 
 
 Great Hall, Stokesay ... .... 150 
 
 Entrance Gate, Stokesay ....... 152 
 
 Heart Shrine, Tenbury . . . . . . .157 
 
 Tomb of Princess Elizabeth, Burford . . . . .160 
 
 Perpendicular Font, Burford ...... 162 
 
 Pentamerus Knightii . . . . . . .168
 
 DOORWAY TO NORMAN CHAPEL, LUDLOW CASTLE. 
 
 LuDiowTowN AND NEIGHBOURHOOD 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 INTRODUCTORY. 
 
 IN a modern work on English antiquities, Ludlow is spoken 
 of as " the Queen of our inland watering-places." Though 
 not too strong as a term of praise, this statement is to a 
 great extent misleading, as in the ordinary acceptation of 
 the phrase Ludlow is not a watering-place at all. But to 
 the dweller in crowded cities, to the jaded man of business, 
 to the antiquary, artist, amateur photographer, naturalist, 
 geologist, or lover of nature, it is something a great deal 
 better. To all these the place is a rich mine of good things, 
 but it is not a watering-place ; and for those who seek 
 crowded hotels and brass bands its beauties are not revealed.
 
 2 LUDLOW TOWN AND NEIGHBOURHOOD. 
 
 Like most things that turn out well, it is a trifle disappoint- 
 ing at first the visitor arriving by rail has no preparation 
 in the approach to the town, or in the first aspect of the 
 place itself, for the actual wealth of beauty and interest 
 that await him, and it is only on closer acquaintance that 
 he will fully realise it. 
 
 THE BUTTER CROSS, FROM A SIDE- STREET, LUDLOW. 
 
 Then he will find that the town is grouped on the summit 
 of a bold mass of Ludlow rock, that rises at the lower end 
 of a flat and fertile plain. On three sides it is nearly
 
 INTRODUCTORY. 3 
 
 isolated from the neighbouring hills by the rivers Teme and 
 Corve, and on the fourth it gradually merges into a spur of 
 the Clee range. On the side towards the plain, where 
 the rock is precipitous, stand the church and castle crown- 
 ing the summit, the one with its tall and graceful tower, 
 and the other with roofless and crumbling turrets and 
 ivy-covered walls, which still defy the ravages of time, and 
 show an outline against the sky nearly as grand as when 
 they sheltered the Court of the Prince of Wales. The 
 ridge is fortified along its whole outline in continuation of 
 the churchyard and castle walls, but only one gate-tower 
 remains, and that on the sloping side. The old town, 
 confined within these walls, only covered the upper part 
 of the mound, but in later times the houses have over- 
 flowed nearly to the water's edge, and on the east particu- 
 larly, nearly all the recent growth of the town has extended. 
 Though ancient enough in appearance, it is even more so 
 in reality ; numbers of the houses which show a neat front 
 of brick or stucco, being old within, and often possess early 
 fireplaces, panelling, or staircases, quite unsuspected from 
 the outside. 
 
 ANCIENT CORPORATE SEAL, LUDLOW.
 
 LUDLOW CASTLE, FROM THE NORTH. 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 THE CASTLE : ITS EXTERIOR AND HISTORY. 
 
 First Aspect Outer Walls Sally-port Beacon Tower Ex- 
 ternal Walls Gateway Its Origin Leland's Account of 
 the Fitzwarine Romance Its Castellans The Barons' War 
 Its Occupation by the Mortimers By Richard Plantage- 
 net Sacked by the Lancastrians Restored by Edward IV. 
 Prince Arthur Court of Marches The Lords President 
 " Comus " " Hudibras " Parliamentary Siege Decay. 
 
 OCCUPYING the post of honour, the Castle is the first point 
 to which every stranger directs his steps. Probably the 
 first glimpse he will get of the object of his search will be 
 when reaching the open square, where the old red Market 
 House stood, he sees its high outer walls and nail-studded 
 gate among the tall elms, which, planted more than a 
 hundred years since in the filled-up moat, now make a 
 green wall of foliage round two sides of the first courtyard. 
 And though few sights are more picturesque than this 
 same scene on market days, when the square is filled with 
 the stalls of the country people, who converge to this spot 
 from every direction, yet there is nothing in the first glimpse 
 greatly to raise his hopes or to gratify any high expecta-
 
 THE CASTLE : ITS EXTERIOR AND HISTORY. 5 
 
 tions he has already formed of this celebrated ruin. The 
 entrance arch, flanked by projecting buttresses, is grim 
 enough, but the gate-tower is too much shattered with age 
 to be at all striking, and the walls near it are without 
 character. But if he will turn to the right, through an iron 
 wicket, down a wide gravel path, once part of the moat, 
 and past a square tower without windows or even loops, 
 he will see, behind large trees, a more considerable block of 
 towers, with a fine chimney ; and when he reaches the 
 trees, where the old town wall, on his right, ends, he will 
 begin to realise the unrivalled beauty and boldness of its 
 site. For between their trunks a prodigious prospect 
 opens out, stretching from the foot of the hill, across fields, 
 and farms, and woods, for miles. 
 
 Behind him, at the base of the walls, is a small outwork, 
 built out on a mass of ' Ludlow ' rock, and by clambering 
 round it he can reach a very curious little sally-port, which 
 the outwork was doubtless intended to cover. The door 
 still remains, and is protected in a unique manner with 
 slabs of stone bolted to the woodwork, and iron plates over 
 them, which would resist an attack of fire for a long time. 
 
 Below the sally-port the path turns to the left, and, 
 emerging from the trees, brings suddenly into view one of 
 the main blocks of towers which, lifting their massive 
 shapes into the sky, compel our admiration and awe, defy- 
 ing as they have done the attacks of man or " the wreckful 
 siege of battering days " to reduce them. From the 
 beacon-cresset on the topmost battlements to the great 
 drain openings at the foot, where it is difficult to distinguish 
 the masonry from the solid rock, the whole of this stupen- 
 dous mass is full of the most varied and interesting detail, 
 and clothed with lichens and wallflowers and weeds on 
 every ledge and cranny. The curtain wall beyond is 
 pierced by the tall and graceful windows of the Great Hall, 
 often called the Comus Room, from the performance therein 
 of Milton's celebrated Masque. The path continues round 
 the walls, commanding fine views over the meadows below, 
 with the river its current stilled by mill- weirs lower down 
 flowing sluggishly through them. The castle on the one 
 hand and the view of distant country on the other con- 
 tinually arrest the attention, until the path passing through 
 an avenue of fine trees, the one is nearly hidden and the 
 other completely lost. Here the path divides, one branch
 
 LUDLOW TOWN AND NEIGHBOURHOOD. 
 
 descending steeply to the Castle Mill in the road below, 
 and the other going straight through the avenue. These 
 walks were laid out, and the trees which add so greatly to 
 their beauty planted in 1772 by the Countess of Powis. 
 Of course the stern and defensive appearance of the place 
 has thereby been reduced, but they are a great additional 
 charm, and a source of much health and pleasure to hun- 
 dreds of inhabitants and visitors. By keeping to the 
 upper one, we emerge through enormous wych-elms into 
 an open space level with the castle wall, where an archway 
 has been cut through it near its junction with that defend- 
 ing the town. Passing through the arch, on the left is a 
 large fragment of building, once the court-house. Another 
 modern archway admits into the area of the old moat, now 
 level with the street. Passing under the trees, populous 
 with colonies of rooks, the visitor will find he has com- 
 pleted the circuit of the castle, eleven acres in extent, and 
 arrived once more at the entrance. Let him lift the latch 
 boldly no warder now to challenge and enter the outer 
 court. 
 
 HISTORY. 
 
 But before examining in detail the massive ruins that 
 lie before him, it will be well to glance, in a manner neces- 
 sarily brief, at the long series of brilliant events which 
 make up their history, and to enumerate a few of the great 
 men whose names are linked with their varying fortunes. 
 
 Great obscurity hangs over the castle's first foundation, 
 and learned authorities have differed as to the identity of 
 its original builder ; but it is almost certain that Roger de 
 Lacy, who held the estate from Osborne Fitz Richard, 
 erected at the end of the eleventh century the keep tower. 
 This Roger rebelled against William II., and later, on the 
 death of his brother Hugh, it became the property of the 
 Crown. Henry I. granted it to Pagan Fitz John, who was 
 slain by the Welsh in 1136. A romance of the first part of 
 the thirteenth century* which gives a history of the Fitz- 
 warine family, states that in the reign of Stephen the 
 castle was held by one Joce de Dinan, who " made the 
 Castle of three wardes, and surrounded it with a double 
 foss, one within and one without." It appears that 
 * Wright's " History of Ludlow." 1852.
 
 THE CASTLE : ITS EXTERIOR AND HISTORY. 
 
 CASTLE, FROM THE RIVER ABOVE LUDLOW. 
 
 Stephen had seized the estate of Fitz John, and placed as 
 castellan in Ludlow, Joce de Dinan. Joce was in rebellion 
 in 1139, and Stephen, accompanied by Prince Henry of 
 Scotland, unsuccessfully laid siege to the castle. It was 
 during this siege that Prince Henry, approaching too near,
 
 8 LUDLOW TOWN AND NEIGHBOURHOOD. 
 
 was siezed by a grappling machine thrown from the wall, 
 and was being dragged away when King Stephen rode up, 
 and saved him by severing the cords with his sword. 
 
 From a thirteenth century history of Wigmore Abbey,* 
 by a monk of that house, we learn that " there arose at this 
 time a very great war between Sir Hugh de Mortimer 
 (of Wigmore) and Sir Joce de Dinan. Insomuch that this 
 same Joce could not freely, or at his pleasure, enter or quit 
 his castle for fear of Sir Hugh, so pertinaciously the latter 
 pursued him. And because Joce could avail nothing 
 against him by force, he set spies along the road where he 
 heard Sir Hugh was to pass unattended, and took him and 
 held him in his castle in prison till he had paid his ransom 
 of 3,000 marks of silver, besides all his plate, horses, and 
 hawks." In the above-mentioned romance his place of 
 imprisonment is spoken of as " the highest tower in the 
 third bailey, which is called to this day Mortimer's." Of 
 this romance the following is Leland's account, given in his 
 " Collectanea," under the head " Thinges excerptid out 
 of an old Englisch boke yn ryme of the Gestes of Guarine 
 
 & his sunnes Guarine wedded Mellet & had a sunne 
 
 caulid Fulco. Joos, a knight, was left as governor to 
 young Fulco. Guarine & he defendid his lands agayne one 
 Walter, the greatest of the marche lorde oute of Lacy & 
 Ludlow. They met at a bent by Bourne, at a brydge 
 ende a little from Ludlow. Joos bare a sheld of sylver 
 with thre blew lyons coronid with gold. Joos had a 
 daughter caullid Hawise, whom Fulco entirely loved, & 
 seying her in great dolour, askid the cause of her sorrow, & 
 she answered that it was no matter for an hauker to amende ;. 
 & he upon that toke his sworde and spere to rescew Joos. 
 her father, as one Godarde was about to streke of his hede ; 
 so that Godarde was slayne of him, & Gwalter Lacy dryven 
 away. Then Joos recovered a horse & sore woundid Syr 
 Arnold that did hym much hurt. Then Fulco killid one 
 Andrew, a knight longging to Syr Walter Lacy. Gwalter 
 Lacy & Syr Arnold were taken prisoners, & put in the 
 Castle of Ludlow in a prison caullid Pendower. A gentil- 
 woman caullid Marion deliverid both these knights by 
 treason oute of Pendower for love of Syr Arnolde de Lis, 
 one of them that promised her falsely marriage. Fulco 
 Guarine wedded Hawise, daughter to Joos, at Ludlow 
 "Wright's History of Ludlow," 1852.
 
 THE CASTLE : ITS EXTERIOR AND HISTORY. o/ 
 
 Castel. Joos & Fulco Guarine toke a journey into Ireland ; 
 Marion tarried, faining sickness, behind, & write a lettre to 
 her lovre Syr Arnold de Lis, to cum secretly to her up into 
 the Castel with a ladder of leder & cordes. Arnold came 
 according to Marion's desier, & had his pleasure of her ; & 
 sone after came his band, & secretly scalinge the walls, 
 killed the castellanes. Then Marion, seeing this treason, 
 lept out of a tower & brake her neck ; * & Arnold killed 
 after many of the burgesses of Ludlow towne, sparing 
 neither widow nor child. Walter Lacy hearing that the 
 castel was won, cam with his band thither, & mannid & 
 vitailid Ludlow, keeping it as his owne. This tidings was 
 told to Joos lying at Lamborne. Joos & Fulco, & his 
 father Guarine, cam to rescue Ludlow, & in assaulting it 
 killid many of Lacy's men. Lacy, with a band of men, 
 cam oute to fight with them, but he losing many men, was 
 fayne to recoyle within the toune. Gualter Lacy sent to 
 the Prince of Wales for help, & he cam wynning by the way, 
 Whitington. Fulco Guarine hurte the prince of Wales in 
 the shoulder & drave hym to a castel caullid Cayhome, 
 where Cay had been lorde, there asseging by three days 
 killid many of them at a certen issue. Fulco was wounded, 
 & yet roode to mete King Henry by Gloscestre, of whom 
 he was welle intertaynid as his kinnesman, & there he had 
 his wounde that Arnold's brother gave hym in the waste 
 welle helid. King Henry made Fulco a knight & steward 
 of his house, & lord & governor of thos marches." 
 
 It has been made clear, however, by Mr. Eyton, the 
 historian of Shropshire, that portions of this story are not 
 in accord with the real history of the castle, which after 
 the death of Joce in 1166, was restored by Henry II. to 
 Hugh de Lacy. The growing power in Ireland of this 
 Hugh led Henry again to seize the castle in 1181, and he 
 granted the estates of Hugh, after his assassination in 
 Ireland, to Walter, his son, retaining the castle, which, 
 however, Walter regained in 1206, on paying 400 marks to 
 King John. In 1207 it was again taken by John, and 
 handed over to William de Braose. It was for a time in 
 charge of Philip de Albini, and then of Thomas de Erdington. 
 In 1214 John ordered Ingeram de Cygoine to restore the castle 
 to Walter de Lacy. In 1224 Walter gave it up to William de 
 
 * In Wright's translation she first kills Sir Arnold with his own 
 sword while he was asleep.
 
 10 LUDLOW TOWN AND NEIGHBOURHOOD. 
 
 Gammages. It was afterwards held by Peter de Geneva, 
 who married Matilda de Lacy, one of the grand-daughters 
 of Walter. Peter made over the constableship to William 
 de Lacy in 1234. Peter died in 1249, and his widow 
 married Geoffrey de Genville, who next held the castle. 
 Peter de Genville, their son, held it in 1292. During the 
 Barons' War the castle and neighbourhood was the scene 
 of prolonged turmoil, in which the king, the barons, and the 
 Welsh took a leading part, and which continued till the 
 victory of Henry at Evesham, after which comparative 
 tranquility seems to have reigned, broken occasionally by 
 the local squabbles of the Lords Marchers, among whom 
 the Mortimers were the most prominent and powerful. 
 They added Ludlow to their other great possessions by the 
 marriage of Roger to Joan de Genville, daughter and 
 heiress of Peter. Roger Mortimer, his son, received 
 Edward III. in his Castles of Ludlow and Wigmore. After 
 his attainder and execution, his son Edmund recovered this 
 and other castles in 1354, and the estates passed out of the 
 family on the death of this Edmund, the last Mortimer, in 
 1424, and into the hands of his nephew, Richard Plan- 
 tagenet, Duke of York, who selected it as his chief place of 
 residence, and when, thirty years later, he involved himself 
 in intrigues for the possession of the throne, he twice found 
 it necessary to retreat here, and raise an army among his 
 tenantry. But on the second occasion he was defeated and 
 taken prisoner by Henry VI. Having afterwards been 
 appointed Protector by the House of Commons and again 
 making war on the royal party, he had, in 1459, fortified 
 himself at Ludford, where he was joined by the army of 
 Lord Salisbury, returning victorious from Bloreheath. He 
 had repulsed one attack by the king's army on the I3th of 
 October, and had planned a surprise in which they would 
 have been almost certain of success, when he was deserted 
 by his principal officer and the troops under him. In this 
 position he broke up the camp and fled to Ireland. The 
 Lancastrians thus having Ludlow at their mercy, revenged 
 themselves for the support it had always given, to the 
 House of York by sacking it and the castle. 
 
 The duke's eldest son, Edward, Earl of March, now 
 came forward, and revived the cause of the Yorkists by his 
 courageous and able tactics. Having defeated the king at 
 the battle of Northampton, his father, hearing of his
 
 THE CASTLE : ITS EXTERIOR AND HISTORY. n 
 
 success, hastened to England, and laid claim to the crown, 
 but was defeated and killed at Wakefield, and his second 
 son murdered. Edward was here, at Ludlow, when the 
 news reached him, and immediately prepared to attack 
 the victors ; but was recalled by the advance of an Irish 
 and Welsh army under the Earl of Pembroke. They 
 fought at Mortimer's Cross, a little south of Ludlow, and 
 Edward was again victorious. Shortly afterwards, march- 
 ing on London, he was proclaimed king, as Edward IV. in 
 1461. 
 
 Ludlow, whose fortunes had suffered with those of the 
 Yorkists, shared abundantly in their prosperity. From 
 this time the castle became the palace of the Prince of Wales, 
 the seat of the Council of the Marches, and the centre of 
 government for the whole Border. 
 
 In the first year of his reign the king granted an extended 
 charter to the town, which greatly advanced its prosperity, 
 in consideration of " the laudable and gratuitous services 
 which our beloved and faithful subj ects the burgesses of the 
 town have rendered unto us in the obtaining of our right 
 to the crown of England, for a long time past withheld 
 from us and our ancestors, in great peril of their lives, and 
 also the rapines, depredations, oppressions, losses of goods, 
 and other grievances, for us and our sake', in divers ways 
 brought upon them by certain of our competitors." Eleven 
 years after, the king sent his two eldest sons, under the 
 guardianship of their uncle, Earl Rivers, to Ludlow Castle, 
 where they remained until the death of Edward IV., when 
 they were taken to London, and murdered in the Tower by 
 order of their uncle, the Duke of Gloucester, afterwards 
 Richard III. In the reign of Charles II. their remains 
 were discovered, and re-interred in Westminster Abbey. 
 
 The stirring events of Richard's reign are many of them 
 connected with the locality, though not with the town itself. 
 On the accession of Henry VII., after the battle of Bos- 
 worth, he made considerable efforts to restore order and 
 judicial authority to the Marches, placing his son Arthur, 
 the Prince of Wales, at the castle, and paying visits to him 
 there up till the prince's death, in 1502. 
 
 On the death of Prince Arthur, who nominally presided 
 at the Council instituted by Edward IV., a regular Court 
 was established by Henry VII., under a permanent Lord 
 President. As to the origin of this Court of Marches,
 
 12 LUDLOW TOWN AND NEIGHBOURHOOD. 
 
 which for so many years made Ludlow a sort of metropolis 
 to the Welsh Border, a few words may not be at this point 
 out of place. It was due in the first instance to the exis- 
 tence of the ancient and almost unlimited authorities of the 
 Lords Marchers an authority which had its origin in a 
 local condition of affairs during the Norman dynasty, and 
 the political exigencies of various kings of that and later 
 periods. Not only because the conquest of Wales was an 
 important feautre in their programme, but quite as much 
 for the sake of occupying the attention of a warlike and 
 quarrelsome nobility, in directions convenient to themselves, 
 those princes encouraged their barons in the dangerous 
 enterprise of making settlements and seizing territory on 
 the Welsh side of the Border. To enable them to hold the 
 territories they had conquered, this encouragement took 
 the form of giving them complete and independent juris- 
 diction in their several domains ; so that each Lord Marcher, 
 except those of Glamorgan who met in one court at 
 Cardiff had his own court, where he administered the 
 English law, allowing at the same time, from motives of 
 prudence, many of the native laws and customs of the 
 people he had conquered. This authority of the Marchers 
 was not held under any grant from the Crown, being simply 
 connived at for the time, and no doubt was useful enough 
 in holding in check the turbulent people who had so often 
 devastated the Border. But in more civilised times it 
 became necessary to reduce this primitive state of things to 
 better order, and efforts in this direction were made by 
 Henry III. and Henry V., but it was not before the accession 
 of Edward IV. that, as mentioned above, the Council of 
 the Marches was established at Ludlow. Even then the 
 separate jurisdiction of the old Lords Marchers was not 
 altogether superseded, and many feuds and conflicting 
 authorities were the result. But the vigorous policy of 
 Henry VII. finally put an end to this, and set up a per- 
 manent court, under a Lord President, the first to hold the 
 office being William Smyth, Bishop of Lincoln, and founder 
 of Brasenose College. His successors, were Geoffrey Blyth, 
 Bishop of Coventry and Lichfield ; John Veysey, Bishop of 
 Exeter ; and Bishop Lee of Coventry and Lichfield, whose 
 presidency was signalised by many reforms and extremely 
 zealous administration of justice, leaving the Welsh Border 
 in a condition of peace and prosperity. Richard Sampson
 
 THE CASTLE : ITS EXTERIOR AND HISTORY. 13 
 
 followed him in the presidency and bishopric in 1543. In 
 1548, the Duke of Northumberland ; William Herbert, 
 Earl of Pembroke, 1550 ; Richard Heath, Bishop of 
 Worcester, 1553 ; William Herbert, Earl of Pembroke, 
 again, 1556 ; Gilbert Bourne, Bishop of Bath and Wells, 
 who was imprisoned on the accession of Elizabeth ; Sir 
 John Williams, who died at Ludlow, following him. In 
 his place the celebrated Sir Henry Sidney of Penshurst was 
 appointed, in 1559, whose administration, lasting twenty- 
 seven years, is memorable for the great works he accom- 
 plished, and the extreme zeal and prudence with which he 
 regulated the district. His even more distinguished son, 
 Sir Philip Sidney, was resident here during most of his 
 father's tenure of office. 
 
 In the British Museum is a paper describing the " Build- 
 ings and reparacions don by Sir Hy. Sidney upon hr 
 Ma ties howses in the Marches of Wales " referring to 
 Ludlow and Wigmore. Henry Herbert, Earl of Pembroke 
 followed for fourteen years ; Lord Zouch, 1601. Lord 
 Eure, whose wife has an alabaster effigy in the church, does 
 not seem to have shown the same probity as some of his 
 predecessors, as a bond is still in existence between him, 
 as Lord President, and Robert Morgan, Humfrey ap 
 Richard Owen, and Humfrey ap Edward Humfrey, gentle- 
 men, for the payment of 50 to Lord Eure upon his obtaining 
 a grant for the sessions and quarter sessions being held at 
 Harlech. Lord Gerard, 1616 ; Earl of Northampton, 1617 ; 
 Earl of Bridgwater, 1633. On certain adventures en- 
 countered by the latter and his family while passing through 
 the neighbouring Haye Woods, on his arrival, was founded 
 the plot of Milton's celebrated dramatic poem, or masque, 
 " Comus," which was written for the earl, and acted by 
 his children in the great hall of the castle on Michaelmas 
 Night, 1634. Macaulay speaks of this poem as " certainly 
 the noblest of the kind which exists in any language. The 
 speeches must be read as majestic soliloquies, and he who 
 reads them will be enraptured with their eloquence, their 
 sublimity, and their music ; but the finest passages are 
 those which are lyric in form as well as in spirit." 
 
 Ludlow has through its castle other links of connection 
 with great literary names. Samuel Butler resided here 
 when secretary to the Earl of Carberry (the succeeding 
 Lord President to that last named), who made him steward
 
 14 LUDLOW TOWN AND NEIGHBOURHOOD. 
 
 of the castle, where probably a good deal of his great work 
 " Hudibras " was written, in which humorous poem 
 Cromwell and his son, Fleetwood, Desborough, and Prynne, 
 with most of the prominent Puritans, are satirised. An- 
 other name great in literature, though in a very different 
 branch of it to Butler, is associated with this grim old pile 
 that of Richard Baxter, the great Puritan divine. Born in 
 Shropshire, he lived at Ludlow, when about seventeen, as 
 a pupil of the chaplain to the Council. The " Holy 
 Dying " of Bishop Jeremy Taylor was written to console 
 his friend, Lord Carberry, for the death of his wife, who, 
 in her youth, was the Lady Alice Egerton of Milton's 
 " Comus." 
 
 The position of the castle, especially its nearness to the 
 high rock called Whitcliff, was such as to make it an easy 
 prey to artillery of any great length of range, so that it 
 was far from being the impregnable fortress it had hitherto 
 been held, when the Parliamentary wars began. It held 
 out for some time against the Parliamentary forces, but 
 when seriously invested by Sir William Brereton, in 1646. 
 was compelled to surrender. In 1651 it was dismantled, 
 and the furniture and fittings sold ; the Court of Marches 
 was virtually abolished then, but at the Restoration, being 
 nominally set up again, the Earl of Carberry, the Duke of 
 Beaufort (1672), and Earl of Macclesfield (1687) were 
 Governors. In 1684, the Duke of Beaufort made a Pro- 
 gress through Wales, and the MS. of Thos. Dingley, who 
 accompanied him, show the castle to be still entire and to 
 have been more or less re-furnished. 
 
 During the popular ferment which preceded the Revo- 
 lution of 1688, the local gentry met and declared for the 
 Prince of Orange, and Lord Herbert seized the castle, and 
 secured in it some adherents of the king. In the next year 
 the Court of Marches was finally abolished, and the castle, 
 though held by a governor for the Crown, was suffered to 
 gradually decay, a process hastened in the reign of George I. 
 by the stripping of the lead from the roofs. Buck, in 1731, 
 describes some of the apartments as entire.
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 INTERIOR OF THE CASTLE. 
 
 The Outer Ward Barracks Mortimer's Tower Bridge and 
 Inner Gate The Inner Ward Norman Keep Other Nor- 
 man Work Round Chapel Prince Arthur's Room Great 
 Hall State Apartments. 
 
 ON entering the outer ward, we are confronted by a fine- 
 pile of ruins on the other side of the open space. This 
 space has been encroached upon at the right hand by the 
 garden of a private house erected within the walls, and on 
 the left is a row of battlemented ruins of Tudor character, 
 probably barracks and stables (23 on plan). They had 
 coats of arms showing them to be work of the end of the 
 sixteenth century.* But the chief thing which attracts the 
 eye and rivets the attention is the great Norman keep, 
 which, rising on the far side of the inner moat, forms with 
 the Elizabethan bridge which replaced the older draw- 
 bridge, and some subordinate gables near it the chief 
 feature of the main or inner ward. These buildings, being 
 the most vital part of the castle, are placed at the more 
 remote angle of the space, where the rock is steepest and 
 least accessible. Going towards the keep, on the left is 
 Mortimer's Tower (i on plan), which is identified as the 
 place of Mortimer's imprisonment in the I3th century ; but 
 it is, mostly at any rate, of later date, which is accounted 
 for by the statement in the Fitzwarine romance, that the 
 .original Mortimer's Tower " was nearly levelled with the 
 ground " in the struggle between Walter de Lacy and Joce 
 de Dinan. The lower story has a good vaulted ceiling. 
 Still more to the left are buildings erected by Sir H. Sidney 
 as a court-house and record office for the Court of Marches. 
 Reaching the ivy-covered bridge, we see that the windows 
 of the keep have been enlarged in the fifteenth century, 
 except two, which are Norman and very fine. The heavy 
 Gothic arches of the inner gate are before us, and over it 
 the later and lighter work of Sidney, in which is a sculp- 
 tured slab with this inscription under the royal arms : 
 " Anno Domini Millesimo Quingentesimo Octagesimo com- 
 * This carving fell down a few years ago and was allowed to perish.
 
 i6 
 
 LUDLOW TOWN AND NEIGHBOURHOOD. 
 
 THE KEEP AND INNER MOAT, LUDLOW CASTLE. 
 
 pleto anno regni Illustrissimae ac Serenissimae Reginae, 
 Elizabethae Vicesimo Tertio Currante." And below it, 
 with the arms of Sidney and Elizabeth : " Hominibus 
 Ingratis Loquimini Lapides Anno Regni Reginas Eliza- 
 bethae 23. The 22 year complet of the Presidency of Sir
 
 INTERIOR OF THE CASTLE. 17 
 
 Henri Sydney, Knight of the Most Noble Order of the 
 Garter, etc., 1581." The motive of this latter portion is 
 said to be found in the thankless work this benefactor of 
 Ludlow performed in Ireland ; though, in that case, why 
 these stones should bear witness to man's ingratitude is not 
 very obvious. 
 
 GATEWAY TO INNER WARD, LUDLOW CASTLE. 
 
 THE INNER WARD. 
 
 The arches on the inner side of this portal are all late 
 Tudor, forming part of Sidney's alterations. Passing under 
 them into the inner court, considerably smaller than the 
 first, and surrounded by much larger buildings, the keep on 
 the left is still the principal feature, and should be first 
 examined. It was the starting point of the original castle, 
 but not, as was generally the case, complete, within itself. 
 Its vaulted basement, entered by a passage and flight of 
 steps, contains two pairs of Norman arches, and has the 
 appearance of having formed, or at least part of it, the 
 earlier chapel of the Norman fortress, the character of the
 
 i8 LUDLOW TOWN AND NEIGHBOURHOOD. 
 
 work being much plainer than that in the beautiful circular 
 one in the court-yard. It was probably afterwards used as 
 a dungeon. In the thickness of the east wall is a very 
 singular passage, of which there have been many explana- 
 tions, of various degrees of improbability, the most popular 
 being that it was an arrangement for letting loose wild 
 beasts upon the prisoners. It is twelve feet long, and 
 opens at each end by square-headed doorways from the 
 large chamber. As it was obviously part of the original 
 design, and as there are evidences on the vaulting that there 
 was originally a partition wall across the chamber, this 
 passage must have been intended as a communication 
 between the two rooms. The fact that the doors opened 
 inwards towards the passage and were strongly barred on 
 that side, makes it still more curious. It may be that it 
 was designed to enable either half of the chamber to be 
 used as a dungeon. There are two rectangular holes in the 
 vault above, but they are comparatively modern alterations, 
 probably for ventilation. The rooms above are now reached 
 by a doorway made in the fifteenth century (which has 
 some beautiful late panelling), and a flight of steps. Most 
 of the original doors and windows have been re-modelled 
 about the same time. In continuation of these steps, a 
 staircase leads to the top of this tower, which is well worth 
 climbing, as the trouble of the ascent is abundantly re- 
 warded by the magnificent view it commands. 
 
 Bearing in mind the position of the well, and the circular 
 chapel, and the presence of Norman work in the north- 
 eastern group of buildings, it seems that the later Norman 
 fortress must have included all the ground occupied by the 
 inner court : an unusually large area. 
 
 Of this chapel only the circular nave remains. It is an 
 exquisite example of twelfth century art, and one of the 
 very few of that shape now remaining. It is entered on 
 the west by a deeply recessed doorway, enriched with 
 chevron, double billet, and other characteristic mouldings. 
 Above a string course of double billets, are three large 
 Norman windows, and below it, two late square-headed 
 openings have been pierced. Round the interior walls is 
 an arcade of fourteen arches, which had in the sixteenth 
 century oak panelling with the coats of arms of successive 
 Lords of Ludlow. The panels may still be seen at the Bull 
 Hotel (in the " Bull Ring "), itself an interesting house.
 
 INTERIOR OF THE CASTLE. 
 
 DOORWAY TO KEEP, LUDLOW CASTLE.
 
 2O LUDLOW TOWN AND NEIGHBOURHOOD. 
 
 The chancel arch of three orders, profusely ornamented 
 with sunk star, chevron, and other mouldings, is supported 
 on each side by four elegant shafts, and now opens into a 
 small bare space, showing the probable extent of the 
 chancel, though it has often been stated that it reached to 
 the east wall of the castle. If it did, it was certainly a 
 later addition. 
 
 The remaining ruins will be best described by means of 
 the accompanying plan. The square tower in the south- 
 west corner marked (21), which is of Norman workmanship, 
 has the lower story converted into an immense oven, and 
 there are other evidences of its having been the bakery, 
 though the kitchen is at the spot marked (17). In the 
 opposite corner of the space is the well, still of great depth, 
 though dry ; and near it another square tower, also more 
 or less Norman. In the next group, which are all fourteenth 
 century, with a few alterations, the corner one (16) is known, 
 as Prince Arthur's Room, and was so called in the inventory 
 of 1651, when the furniture was sold by the Cromwellian 
 Government. The walls of this tower are pierced with 
 recesses, wall-passages, windows, &c., of the most intricate 
 kind, and are worthy of the closest study. Communicating 
 with it is the Hall (15), frequently called the Comus Room, 
 the shell of which, now roofless and open to the cellars, 
 shows it to have been a beautiful chamber. Entered from 
 the court by an ascending slope (once a flight of marble 
 steps), and a fine pointed arch with graceful mouldings, it 
 is lighted by three tall windows in the outer wall, and two 
 larger ones in the inner, which have their fourteenth century 
 tracery remaining. Between the latter is a smaller six- 
 teenth century insertion. The block at the east end of the 
 hall contained the state apartments. No. 14 was called the 
 banquetting-room, and contains a good fire-place and 
 doorways. The principal rooms beyond (12 and 10) are 
 called the armoury and the " Apartments of the Two 
 Princes " (Edward V. and his brother), but on doubtful 
 authority. It is also stated that the fifteenth century 
 traceried window in the latter room was the scene of the 
 tragic end of Marion de la Bruere ; but obviously without 
 a shadow of probability, as the size of the opening would 
 not allow any one to jump out, and the window was not 
 built for at least two centuries after that event. These 
 rooms are part of a very fine and well-proportioned mass
 
 Jround Plan of Ludlow Castle. 
 
 No. No. 
 
 1. Mortimer's Tower. 17. 
 
 2. Modern ice-house. 18. 
 
 3. Inner moat. 
 
 4. Stone bridge of two arches. 19. 
 
 5. Buildings erected by Sir Henry Sydney. 20. 
 
 6. The porter's lodge. 21. 
 
 7. A newel staircase leading to the top ol the Keep. 22. 
 
 8. The Chapel. 23. 
 
 9. Supposed site of the Choir of the Chapel. i 24. 
 10. Apartments occupied by the two Princes, sons of I 25. 
 
 Edward IV. 26. 
 
 13. Beacon Tower. 27. 
 
 14. The State Apartments. 28. 
 
 15. The Hall or Council Room. 29. 
 
 16. Prince Arthur's Room. 30. 
 
 The Kitchen. 
 
 Probably the original Chapel, afterwards con- 
 verted into a prison. 
 
 The well, now about eighty-five feet deep. 
 Postern tower. 
 Bakehouse tower. 
 Small Chamber in Keep. 
 
 Stables, coach-house, &c. [the Town. 
 
 The principal gateway, leading to the Castle from 
 Modern fire-engine shed. 
 Modern house. 
 
 Early tower, probably Norman. 
 Modern palisades across the Outer Court. 
 A Sallyport. 
 The Castle Yard, or Outer Court.
 
 22 
 
 LUDLOW TOWN AND NEIGHBOURHOOD. 
 
 ^..- 
 
 LUDLOW CASTLE, FROM THE MEADOWS. 
 
 of towers which stand out from the line of ramparts and 
 rise from the rock, which is itself more than a hundred feet 
 above the river. The one to the east of the group (n) juts 
 out into the inner moat, and, in the lower part, is of Norman 
 work. Near this tower is a built-up doorway in the wall, 
 by means of which, and a plank across the moat, the sally- 
 port already described could be reached. 
 
 In the outer wall to the north of the gate is a plain square 
 tower (27), which though of very early masonry has no 
 architectural features to identify it. If Norman, it would 
 indicate a very extensive area for the original castle.
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 THE PARISH CHURCH. 
 
 Its Situation South Side First Impression Scene from 
 Churchyard Its History Interior Hexagonal Porch 
 Nave Arcades Aisles Rood Loft Collegiate Stalls 
 Miserere Carvings The Lady-Chapel Its Screen The 
 Font St. John's Chapel Its Screen and Fittings Ancient 
 Glass The Chancel Vestry Sedilia Reredos Treasure 
 Chamber Monuments . 
 
 THE traveller will not have been long in Ludlow before 
 becoming aware of its magnificent collegiate church. For 
 seven long miles, up or down the vale, its venerable tower 
 is a landmark in the scene. Arriving by rail, it is the first 
 object that arrests his attention, rising majestically above 
 the roofs and chimneys of the houses that hem it in on 
 almost every side, though of the church itself very little can 
 be seen even from the streets. But if, passing through the 
 Bull Ring, we turn along a narrow passage behind the old 
 building called the Butter Cross, we are close upon it at 
 once so close, indeed, that the walls rise like one sheer cliff 
 of rugged sandstone, and nave and transept and aisle are 
 merged into a mass of confused masonry, weather-beaten 
 and time-worn, but relieved with buttress and pinnacle, 
 and pierced with many windows. Over all, the tall central 
 tower, even more weather-worn and grim, soars above the 
 church, still showing through the stains of centuries rich 
 traceries and sculptured niches, and great belfry windows, 
 round which the jackdaws chatter and whirl. 
 
 We are standing by the south porch, which, with its 
 mouldered surface and restored quoins and buttresses, 
 presents a curious mixture of picturesque age and formal 
 newness ; if we pass through its elegantly vaulted interior 
 and enter the church, a most impressive scene is before us. 
 Through the long rows of shafted pillars, their dusky forms 
 relieved against the streaming light from the great windows 
 in the lantern, the distant choir and chapels show dimly, 
 and between the tracery of their oaken screens the subdued 
 sparkle of ancient glass. The great half-arches which span 
 the aisles at their eastern ends, and support the transept
 
 24 LUDLOW TOWN AND NEIGHBOURHOOD. 
 
 PARISH CHURCH AND OLD HOUSE IN CHURCHYARD. 
 
 walls, are reared against the tower like huge flying but- 
 tresses, and allow the eye to range at will over the transepts 
 and side chapels. 
 
 If we move forward into the nave, a long vista opens 
 eastward the entire length of the church, broken only at 
 the chancel arch by the dark mass of the rood-screen, and 
 ended only by the storied panes of the great east window. 
 The impressiveness of the whole is owing in no small 
 degree to the extreme beauty and refinement of the per- 
 vading colour. The ruddy tone of the external walls is 
 here exchanged for a pale yellow-grey, sobered with age, 
 and varied with the broken colour of mortar and time stains, 
 which harmonise well with the rich brown of the woodwork,
 
 THE PARISH CHURCH. 25 
 
 the warm glow of stained windows, and the sombre tone of 
 the screens and roof timbers. In wealth of colour and 
 glow of light it culminates in the chancel, where the windows 
 of great size and height, and only divided by slender 
 buttresses are all filled with rich glass : that in the east 
 end setting forth the life and martyrdom of the patron 
 saint, St. Lawrence ; and below it is the stone reredos of 
 fine tabernacle-work, gorgeous with colour and gilding. 
 
 Where the chancel is entered by the groined portal under 
 the rood-loft, the old stalls, from which the brethren of the 
 College of Palmers chanted their daily service, remain in 
 nearly their pristine beauty ; but the sculptured monu- 
 ments beyond them, where groups of effigies lie in stony 
 repose, are not theirs. Whatever memorials may have 
 marked the place of their rest have long since been super- 
 seded by grim Lords Marchers and their stately dames. 
 But they were, perhaps, not less remembered. This noble 
 fabric itself is their monument ; and as we wander under 
 its long arcades and explore its dim recesses, we shall realise 
 more and more what a grand memorial it is. 
 
 But before examining it in detail, let us turn through the 
 north door into the churchyard, where we shall see the 
 building free from the houses which choke the view on other 
 sides, and realise, in a manner impossible from any other 
 place, the extreme beauty of the site. Here, in the dark 
 avenue of yew-trees, the reigning stillness, in pleasant con- 
 trast to the bustle of the narrow streets so close at hand, is 
 emphasised rather than disturbed by the sleepy echo of the 
 church clock chiming the quarters, and the intermittent 
 clang of the jackdaws that float far above in aerial evolu- 
 tions, circling in noisy clamour round the tower, or sunning 
 themselves in secure enjoyment of the square putlock holes 
 so invariably left by the old builder, and so carefully filled 
 up by the modern restorer. 
 
 Down the long perspective of rugged stems and dark 
 foliage, the projecting mass of grey wall and buttress, with 
 the fine flamboyant windows, is the north transept, an iron 
 arrow on the apex of its gable marking it as the Fletchers' 
 Chancel ;* and beyond it the chequered walls of the build- 
 ing known as the Reader's House a quaint and delightful 
 seventeenth century house of stone, plaster, and carved 
 oak is just discernible. 
 
 * The gift of a Company of Fletchers, or arrow-makers.
 
 26 
 
 LUDLOW TOWN AND NEIGHBOURHOOD. 
 
 DOORWAY TO OLD HOUSE IN CHURCHYARD. 
 
 This churchyard, beautiful as it is at this day, must in 
 earlier times have been a very delightful place, more like a 
 quadrangle or cloister garth to the college than an ordinary 
 churchyard. From the far side of the open space the church 
 to its topmost pinnacles is visible, towering above the dark 
 line of yews which gird it at all seasons in a belt of living 
 green. To the right, Hosier's Almshouses, a Gothic build- 
 ing of stone, erected in 1468, is now a bald brick box, 
 re-edified in the eighteenth century by the Corporation, 
 who inscribed upon it " Resuscitarunt, ampliarunt, orna- 
 runt ! " The College, in a line with it, has a little more 
 character, and retains its fifteenth century portal, but has 
 been lately made a Cottage Hospital. The old Rectory, 
 also (as I believe) a part of the College, is picturesque in 
 outline, but has likewise been recently renovated. Some 
 old-fashioned and diminutive houses of red brick, with the 
 Reader's House, shut in the eastern side.
 
 THE PARISH CHURCH. 27 
 
 But on the north side all is open, and as we lean on the 
 low wall that surmounts the old town ramparts, and look 
 across the broad prospect, as of old the Brethren of the 
 Guild must often have looked, in their quiet pacing on this 
 level space, there is doubtless much in the wide expanse of 
 cultivated plain, into which the winding vale of Teme 
 broadens itself, that is as they beheld it : shut in by the 
 same rounded hills that melt into the far horizon, and clothed 
 then, as now, in its sombre mantle of dark woods. But 
 how much that is changed ! From this high terrace they 
 would see where, at the edge of the slope, the Church of 
 St. Leonard now makes, with the masses of trees, a blot of 
 dark in the landscape, the tower and steep Gothic roofs of 
 the Carmelite Monastery of White Friars that " fayre 
 and costly thynge " which, four hundred years ago, John 
 Leland saw nearly covering the flat ground by the windings 
 of the Corve, and of which but one tottering arch remains. 
 And instead of the red-brick villas where the town is ex- 
 tending on the right, only the houses on each side of the 
 steep descent below Corve Gate would meet their eyes. 
 
 HISTORY. 
 
 It may almost be taken for granted that a site so ob- 
 viously fine as this would be occupied before the Norman 
 Conquest ; indeed there is evidence of sepulchral remains 
 there which could hardly have been later than Saxon ; but 
 there is no evidence of a church of that date, no mention of 
 a priest being found in the great Domesday Survey of 
 William the Conqueror. 
 
 The Norman church was doubtless a much smaller 
 building than the present, though somewhat similar in plan. 
 It probably had aisles and a tower. The font in the north 
 chapel is Norman, and in the outer face of the wall near it, 
 is a flat buttress, which is almost certainly of the same date. 
 In an interesting Latin document which Leland met with in 
 the monastery at Cleobury Mortimer, and which a monk of 
 that convent copied for him, is preserved a statement that 
 the people of Ludlow in 1199 found it necessary to enlarge 
 their church, and that in doing it the workmen had to re- 
 move a large tumulus to the west of it, in which were found 
 three mausolea of stone, containing human remains. 
 Professing them to be the bones of three Irish saints the
 
 28 LUDLOW TOWN AND NEIGHBOURHOOD. 
 
 father, mother, and uncle of St. Brandan they re-interred 
 them in the church, in anticipation of numerous miracles 
 and consequent offerings. Whether the bones were Saxon 
 or Roman remains, the above record is valuable as fixing 
 the date of Early English additions to the structure, of 
 which there are indications which, taken altogether, go to 
 show that this later church was of similar dimensions to the 
 present. A theory has been started that it was then a bay 
 shorter in the choir than it is now ; but the very beautiful 
 little window at the back of the high altar, the masonry 
 surrounding it, and the jambs of the east window above it 
 are Early English, and it is impossible to suppose that they 
 were placed there by the fifteenth century builders. The 
 south door, the window jambs in south aisle, and a piscina 
 in the Lady-Chapel, are also Early English. 
 
 The early part of the fourteenth century, when the 
 College of the Palmers' Guild was confirmed in its posses- 
 sions, and obtained formal recognition, was probably the 
 date of the Decorated alterations and additions to the 
 church, viz. : the north aisle, porch, portions of the 
 chapels, the south transept, the beautiful reredos, and 
 parts of the stalls. The next alteration, late in the four- 
 teenth century, would probably be the building of the north 
 transept by the Fletchers, or arrow-makers, whose name is 
 still connected with it, and whose badge it bears on the 
 gable. And when the town flourished so much through the 
 favour of Edward IV., the tower which was perhaps 
 Norman, and was burnt, there is reason to believe, in the 
 war which raged in the district just before his accession 
 was rebuilt as we now see it, together with the nave and 
 greater part of the building, including all the roofs. About 
 this time, probably, the screen, stalls, vestry, and many 
 windows were added. 
 
 When the Guild was dissolved, the church seems to have 
 been administered with the other Guild property by the 
 Corporation, and such papers as refer to it are preserved 
 among the municipal records. The best of these is a book 
 of churchwardens' accounts from 1540 to about 1600, 
 which is of exceptional interest in throwing light on the 
 history of the fabric at and after the Reformation. 
 
 The reredos was probably mutilated in the fourth year of 
 King Edward VI., when an Act was passed for abolishing 
 and putting away divers books and images, and pretty
 
 THE PARISH CHURCH. 29 
 
 generally carried into effect, but the wooden erection which 
 was placed in front of it has the appearance of being con- 
 siderably later, and is said to have been given by Lord 
 Powis in 1764. 
 
 The organ, which is an exceedingly fine one, was given, 
 by Lord Powis at the same time, and was originally erected 
 over the rood-screen. It has been enlarged and improved 
 more than once, and now stands in the north transept. 
 
 The galleries which till 1860 disfigured the aisles were 
 probably put up in the same century, and also the high 
 pews which then existed. It is to be regretted that a 
 quaint pulpit of early eighteenth century character, with a 
 picturesque canopy, was removed at the same time as the 
 latter. 
 
 There are a number of interesting piscinas and lockers, 
 which show that, in addition to the two existing chapels, 
 there were chantries in the transepts, at both ends of the 
 south aisle, and at the east end of the north aisle ; also 
 probably at its west end. 
 
 INTERIOR. 
 
 The south porch is hexagonal, and the only known instance- 
 in this country, except at St. Mary's, Redcliffe and at 
 Chipping Norton. It is almost entirely Decorated ; the 
 principal external details having perished, were renewed 
 some years ago, but within it is untouched. The groining 
 of the vault is very fine and of the same date, but the 
 inner doorway, with its bold mouldings and nook-shafts, is 
 noteworthy as one of the few early English features of the 
 building. Over this porch is a chamber which may have 
 been a residence for chantry priests, or was perhaps a 
 domus inclusi. It is reached by a staircase turret, in the 
 angle, which opens from the church. 
 
 Just within the aisle, on the east, are remains of a late 
 holy-water stoup, and by the staircase door is a niche for a 
 piscina. The nave arcades are carried on each side on five 
 slender columns and two responds, which for the late period 
 of their erection (about 1460) are unusually simple and 
 elegant in design. In plan they are elongated quatrefoils, 
 and have at each projection a shaft with base and capital, 
 between each of which the wave-moulding of the arch above 
 is continued down the pillar. The large piers which support
 
 30 LUDLOW TOWN AND NEIGHBOURHOOD. 
 
 the tower are treated in a similar manner, but on a larger 
 and more elaborate scale, and the arches above them are 
 extremely beautiful and effective. 
 
 The south aisle contains a number of windows now 
 fifteenth century, but in their jambs early English mould- 
 ings can be traced. The corresponding windows in the 
 north aisle, fine examples of the Geometrical Decorated 
 style (about 1320 to 1350), are untouched, and contain in 
 the upper lights the original heraldic glass. 
 
 Both aisles at their eastern ends are continued into the 
 transepts under large half-arches, which are a very con- 
 spicuous feature of the church, and similar ones open into 
 the side chapels, having rich screens across the bottom. 
 
 rood-loft under the chancel arch is supported on a 
 
 ROOD SCREEN AND STALLS, LUDLOW CHURCH.
 
 THE PARISH CHURCH. 31 
 
 very rich and massive oak screen, and was reached by a 
 door in the tower staircase ; unlike the others, this screen 
 has a large opening occupying two-thirds of its width. 
 The lower part is solid panel-work enriched with carving ; 
 above it open tracery, and above that ribbed framework in 
 imitation of vaulting to support the loft. On the eastern 
 side of this screen begin the Collegiate Stalls. 
 
 COLLEGIATE STALLS. 
 
 These stalls are remarkably fine examples of fifteenth 
 century wood work, though the canopies which were once 
 ranged over them are gone,* and many of the small figures 
 have been mutilated or destroyed. They were designed to 
 accommodate the priests of the college, but were doubtless 
 sufficient in number for them and their more distinguished 
 visitors. They extend on each side of the chancel to about 
 half its length, are divided into three lengths by gangways 
 and small flights of steps, and have six upright stall-ends 
 richly carved on each side. These stall-ends are covered 
 in intricate designs with the richest panel-work, and are 
 finished above with the elaborate finials known as " poppy- 
 heads," carved with great variety, hardly any two being 
 alike. Most of them have niches for figures, and several 
 are entirely composed of groups of figures, one being a 
 bishop in episcopal vestments, and one the Virgin with the 
 dead Christ on her knees ; the others from age and ill-usage 
 are difficult to make out. 
 
 THE MISERERES. 
 
 There- are fifteen stalls on each side, and in each the 
 folding seats known as misereres. They were so called 
 from their merciful office in giving support to infirm and 
 aged monks, who might lean upon them in chanting the 
 long conventual services, while appearing to stand. They 
 were a feature in the choir of most cathedral and collegiate 
 churches, and are always exceedingly interesting, from the 
 carvings which are found on their under sides. Great 
 difference of opinion exists as to the meaning and purpose 
 of these carvings, but it seems from the character of them, 
 
 * There are canopies over some of them, attached to the ancient 
 panel-work at the back, but they are modern
 
 32 LUDLOW TOWN AND NEIGHBOURHOOD. 
 
 that at a time when pictures were few and the power to read 
 rare, they were the genre paintings and story books of the 
 Middle Ages. 
 
 Those of Ludlow were not all of the same period, some 
 being earlier than the stalls, others about the same age, 
 and others later. This may be explained if we suppose the 
 stalls to have been burned in the fifteenth century, when the 
 tower was destroyed, and the earlier misereres to have been 
 part of the salvage from that fire. The best executed, 
 earliest, and most interesting are those which represent a 
 distinct subject ; and it is noteworthy that they appear to 
 be the work of the same man,* each bearing an incised 
 mark resembling a sprig of some conventional plant, 
 
 MISERERE CARVING, LUDLOW CHURCH. 
 
 which was no doubt the private mark of the artist. Like 
 nearly all misereres, they are arranged on a uniform plan 
 a central group and two subordinate wings. Some are 
 purely decorative, others appear to be illustrations of the 
 quaint and fabulous Natural History of the Middle Ages, 
 while many are satires directed against the exaggerated 
 costume and gluttonous habits of certain periods. Be- 
 ginning at the west end of the stalls on the south side, the 
 first seat is blank, the second a Tudor rose of poor execu- 
 tion ; (3) is blank. 
 
 xNo. 4 has in the centre a figure in large cap, collar, and 
 gown, holding a scroll, probably a scholastic ; on the left 
 * These are marked x .
 
 THE PARISH CHURCH. 33 
 
 Is an old face in drapery, and on the right a young one. 
 
 xNo. 5 seems to be an attempt to ridicule the worship 
 of the beer barrel. A tun is set on end in the centre, and 
 two men in the costume of the reign of Richard II. are 
 kneeling on either side like a pair of heraldic supporters. 
 The side ornaments are the ale-bench, with barrels, flagons, 
 and drinking-cups : interesting from their unusual design. 
 (6). A man drawing liquor from a diminutive cask with 
 an immense flagon ; he wears a hood, belt and pouch of 
 -the same period as the last. The side ornaments are con- 
 ventional foliage. 
 
 (7). A grotesque monster, with bird's head and wings, 
 which was known as the cockatrice ;* smaller ones at 
 either side, erased. Representations of the fabulous 
 animals, with which mediaeval literature abounded, are 
 frequent on the carved details of churches. 
 
 x(8) Mutilated. A number of cocks and hens, with fox. 
 This was probably meant to illustrate one of the popular 
 fables, which recounts the adventures of Reynard the Fox, 
 In this one the incised sprig is many times repeated, and 
 forms a kind of ground for the birds. The two sides are 
 stiff foliage. 
 
 x(g) A group of five men apparently wrestling. On 
 the left a horse with rich trappings. This group is so 
 :much damaged that its intention is difficult to understand. 
 On the right is a gypciere, or pouch, and a pillow. The 
 gypciere was a kind of external purse made of silk or 
 leather, stitched to a metal frame, and usually had three 
 tassels ; the opening drawn together by a cord, as in this 
 example. It was from this purse attached to the belt that 
 the thieves of the period got the name of " cut-purse." 
 Indeed, it is likely enough that the scene here depicted is 
 that of a traveller who has been dragged from his horse, 
 and is struggling with thieves, and that the group on the 
 -right is the booty for which they contend. It is perhaps 
 
 * The following is an ancient account of the origin of a cockatrice : 
 " When the Cock is past seven years old an egg groweth within him, 
 whereat he wondreth greatly. He seeketh privately a warm place, 
 on a dunghill or in a stable, to which he goeth ten times daily. A 
 toad privily watcheth him, and examineth the nest every day to see 
 af the egg yet be laid. When the toad findeth the egg, he rejoiceth 
 much, and at length hatching it, produceth an animal with the head 
 and breast of a Cock, and from thence downwar.'s the body of a 
 serpent. And that is a Cockatrice."
 
 34 LUDLOW TOWN AND NEIGHBOURHOOD. 
 
 an illustration of the parable of the Good Samaritan, 
 
 (10) An old woman in a peaked hood, seated in a quaint 
 
 three-legged chair, is warming herself at a fire. On the 
 
 right two sides of bacon, on the left a pot hung over a fire. 
 
 (n) A swan rudely executed. On each side stiff foliage. 
 
 (12) An owl in the centre, pigeons at each side. 
 
 (13) Large female head in centre with reticulated head- 
 dress ; small ditto on each side. This seems to be a bur- 
 lesque on the mode of wearing the hair, which came into 
 vogue about the reign of Edward IV., and developed into 
 the horned or mitred shape, of which there are some re- 
 markable examples in church sculptures. 
 
 x(i4) A man in Richard II. costume, with large bundle 
 strapped on his shoulders, is stooping to draw on his large 
 boots. Conventional foliage at sides. 
 (15) A group of stiff foliage. 
 
 x(i6) A man in long frock, with waist-belt and collar, his 
 head bare and hair long. By his side a barrel, pair of 
 bellows (showing a very respectable antiquity for that 
 useful implement), clogs, and hammer. The left pendant 
 is a woman seated on a stool. The right shows an altar- 
 tomb with fourteenth century panelling, spades, skulls and 
 bones, and a pick, above them a hand issuing out of clouds, 
 and holding the holy-water pot. It has been supposed 
 that the principal figure is of a grave-digger ; but the 
 grouping of the hammer, &c., with him, makes that very 
 doubtful. The arms of both figures are broken off ; but 
 the attitude of the woman suggests that she is admonishing 
 the central figure. If we suppose the tools to show him to 
 be a smith, and that he is unduly fond of the barrel at his 
 side, the woman might be pointing to the tomb and its 
 ghastly accompaniments on the other pendant as the 
 certain end of such weakness. 
 
 On the north side, the first at the east end, is another 
 burlesque of the horned head-dress a large female head, 
 with a hideous face, wears the offending coiffure, and on 
 each side are boys jeering, one with a mirror.* The second 
 is a similar subject ; but this time a bat wears the head- 
 dress, and on each side are grotesque monsters. 
 
 x (3) Represents the end of the ale-wife who gave short 
 measure. In the centre group a demon is carrying the 
 unfortunate hostess in the most unceremonious fashion, 
 See illustration page 32,
 
 THE PARISH CHURCH. 35 
 
 with her false measure in her hand, to thrust her into hell- 
 mouth, which is shown on the right hand, while the foul 
 fiend himself plays the pipes. On the left is another 
 demon, reading a long catalogue of her offences.* 
 
 (4) A mermaid with mirror. Fish on each side. 
 
 x(5) Mutilated. A man on the ground, with a woman 
 holding him, and another apparently assisting ; on the left, 
 a pot over a fire. Probably this represented practical 
 joking in a kitchen rather a favourite subject. 
 
 (6) A hart with scroll, a crown round its neck, with 
 chain attached ; grotesque heads on sides. 
 
 (7) The head of a bishop with long hair ; he wears the 
 mitre, amice round the neck, and below may be traced 
 the cope fastened by a morse or buckle ; on the two sides 
 are mitres showing the pendant ornaments, called vittae or 
 infulae. This combination of amice and cope is very un- 
 usual, but occurs in the figure of Bishop Goldwell, in 
 Norwich Cathedral. 
 
 (8) Three groups of Prince of Wales' feathers, of a type 
 rarely met with. This may probably have marked the 
 seat of one of the young heirs apparent, who resided at 
 Ludlow. Perhaps the Tudor rose, above mentioned, 
 marked that of Prince Arthur, and it is quite possible that 
 several of the later carvings may have indicated the seats 
 of important people, as the hart gorged, the swan, and 
 mermaid, are all badges of great families. 
 
 (9) A fox in mitre, hood, and cope, preaching to a. 
 number of geese from a pulpit. Mutilated. This has been 
 supposed to be a satirical attack on the clergy ; but it is 
 more probably another incident from the before-mentioned 
 fable of Reynard the Fox, which was very popular in the 
 Middle Ages ; on the left are a man, woman, and hare,, 
 mutilated, but probably representing another fable. On 
 the right conventional foliage. 
 
 (10) Hunted stag, on each side hounds in pursuit. 
 
 (n) A crowned head, with flowing hair and beard ; 
 conventional foliage at sides. 
 
 (12) An archangel blowing a trumpet ; conventional 
 foliage. 
 
 (13) Hawks on a lure, and lures on each side. 
 
 (14) Blank. 
 
 * She is without clothing, as that was the mediaeval method of 
 representing a soul after death.
 
 36 LUDLOW TOWN AND NEIGHBOURHOOD. 
 
 (15) Tudor roses grouped. 
 
 (16) Blank. 
 
 THE LADY-CHAPEL. 
 
 It will be noticed that the chancel is not parallel to the 
 nave, but this is not due to the accidental cause it has been 
 attributed to, being intended to symbolise the leaning of 
 our Saviour's head upon the Cross. Very likely the 
 position of the two chapels was intended to follow the 
 arrangement of the rood, St. John and the Virgin on each 
 side of the crucifix. They are placed in the angle formed 
 by the chancel and transepts, and are both large lean-to 
 chambers with good Perpendicular roofs, divided from the 
 chancel by the stall wainscoting, and from the transepts by 
 rich screens. That of the chapel on the south (The Lady) 
 has several light shafts, each with plain bases and capitals, 
 rising from a thick beam, and supporting a number of con- 
 verging ribs, which meet in carved bosses and carry the loft 
 above. The three openings are treated like windows, with 
 tracery in four principal lights and six smaller ones. A 
 rich but mutilated fringe of perforated carving completes 
 the whole. Just within the chapel is another piece of old 
 woodwork, one of the original benches, and opposite to it 
 the old Norman font, large, plain, and cylindrical. The 
 latter was restored to the church by Sir Gilbert Scott, after 
 having served for many years as a water-trough. In the 
 upper lights of the east window is a quantity of old glass, 
 extremely good in colour, representing on a background of 
 vine-leaves, &c., a number of crowned heads. There are 
 tablets of moderate age on the walls and piers, and the 
 pavement has many gravestones. Those in the south-east 
 corner are the earliest in the building, being mostly foliated 
 crosses, which have been discovered in various parts of the 
 church. In the south wall, above them, is a fine piscina of 
 similar date (Early English), and near it another opening, 
 probably the original piscina niche, the first having been 
 inserted later. On the back of the stalls dividing the 
 chapel from the chancel is a copy of the Ten Command- 
 ments, painted on boards in old English characters. It has 
 been erroneously described as a reredos of Henry VIII. 's 
 time, but is really " the tables of the Commandments " 
 which, in 1560, were required by the Queen's Commissioners
 
 THE PARISH CHURCH. 
 
 37 
 
 SCREEN OF THE LADY-CHAPEL, & SOUTH TRANSEPT, LUDLOW CHURCH. 
 
 to be set up in the east end of the chancel, " to be not only 
 read for edification, but also to give some comely ornament 
 and demonstration that the same was a place of religion 
 and prayer." 
 
 ST. JOHN'S CHAPEL. 
 
 The screen of the chapel on the north is more elaborately 
 wrought and highly finished than the other. The open- 
 ings are eight in number and much smaller, beginning
 
 38 LUDLOW TOWN AND NEIGHBOURHOOD. 
 
 about breast-high above twice as many tracery panels and 
 a row of perforated quatrefoils, each opening having a 
 single mullion, and the head filled with intricate tracery. 
 Above them the cornice arches over with considerable 
 projection inside the chapel, and supports a loft. 
 
 There are some quaint old benches with poppy-heads 
 within the chapel, and one wall is wainscoted with the 
 drapery panelling. Another portion of the wooden fittings 
 remains in the arched canopy, with angels carved on its 
 bosses, over the east window, intended as a kind of bal- 
 dachino for the altar. In the pavement are many grave- 
 stones, one of which, near the door, has the well-defined 
 matrix of a brass effigy. There is also the matrix of a 
 small brass built into the north wall. 
 
 The glass in this chapel is of great interest, especially 
 that in the east window, depicting in eight groups the 
 "" Legend of the Ring." Briefly, the story is this : King 
 Edward the Confessor having no coin to relieve an old man 
 who asked his alms, gave him a valuable ring. Some time 
 alter, the same ring was given to some pilgrims in the Holy 
 Land by an old man, who told them he was John the 
 Baptist, and who charged them to re-deliver it to King 
 Edward as a token that his death would shortly ensue. 
 The pilgrims, on their return, fulfilled their errand to the 
 king, and have always been stated to be men of Ludlow. 
 The topmost light on the left shows the pilgrims setting 
 sail for Palestine ; (2) the king giving the ring to the old 
 man ; (3) St. John as an old man giving the ring to the 
 pilgrims ; (4) the pilgrims returning the ring to Edward ; 
 (5) the pilgrims going to church in a procession of eccle- 
 siastics ; (6) the pilgrims again before Edward, receiving 
 some gift ; (7) reception of the pilgrims on their return to 
 Ludlow ; (8) a gathering to celebrate their return. At the 
 bottom is a fragment of an inscription, fenetra fieri 
 feceront, which may be taken to confirm the connection of 
 the window with the guild, or, at any rate, to show that it 
 was not given by an individual. A few years ago the old 
 glass occupied only the two centre lights, and it has been, 
 together with that in the other three windows, which was 
 also in a damaged and chaotic condition, restored. The 
 latter are rich and harmonious in colour, and depict : that 
 on the left, Our Lord, with SS. Catherine, Christopher, and 
 others ; the other two, the Twelve Apostles, with portions 
 of the Apostles' Creed.
 
 THE CHANCEL. 
 
 Beyond the stalls, 
 the windows occupy 
 nearly the whole 
 space. They have 
 good Perpendicular 
 tracery of the same 
 design in each, 
 which is continued 
 below them with 
 nearly similar stone 
 panelling on the 
 wall-surface. A 
 well-moulded door- 
 way of the same 
 late style, with good 
 original tre foiled 
 panels and ironwork 
 in the door itself, 
 admits to the vestry, 
 which is lighted by 
 two small square - 
 headed windows of 
 two lights in the 
 north, and one 
 similar in the east 
 wall. Near the 
 latter are a stone 
 bracket for 
 an image 
 and the pis- 
 cina niche, 
 showing it 
 to have 
 been used 
 as a chapel. 
 A smaller 
 chamber, 
 having a 
 fireplace, to 
 the west of 
 
 SEDILIA AND PISCINA, LUDLOW CHURCH.
 
 40 LUDLOVV TOWN AND NEIGHBOURHOOD. 
 
 this, is entered from it by a pointed arch, and was pro~ 
 bably the residence of a chantry priest ; it has one window,, 
 and in it is a fine old iron-bound chest. The arch in north 
 wall of chancel is described later with the monuments, but 
 the piscina and sedilia opposite to it should not be forgotten. 
 They are late, like their surroundings, and have flat, 
 square-topped canopies ; the details, however, are very good' 
 and should be examined. The reredos, which covers the 
 east wall below the window, was discovered before the 
 restoration, in a mutilated condition, and was restored 
 under the direction of Mr. R. K. Penson, R.I., F.S.A., who 
 has kindly furnished me with details which enabled me to 
 make a fairly complete analysis of the whole, which is a 
 deeply interesting work of ancient art. A very short 
 account of it must suffice here. The whole of the upper 
 row, which contains a great number of small figures in 
 tabernacle work, is original, also that below, which has not 
 much projection, including the door-head, with the knight 
 and dragon in combat. All the detached figures under 
 canopies are modern, from drawings by Overbeck, and the 
 projecting canopies in the lower row are conjectural from 
 the remains of the old ones, which had been cut down to 
 one level, as also had the five bas-reliefs over the altar, 
 which were re-produced on the original lines. They represent 
 the Nativity, Baptism, Crucifixion, Resurrection, and 
 Ascension, of Our Lord. Portions of the colour and gilding 
 are original. In the south wall, near the piscina, is a small 
 doorway leading to a chamber at the back, which is lighted 
 by the exquisite little thirteenth century window before 
 mentioned. Many explanations of various degrees of 
 probability have been given for its presence here, but the 
 most likely are that it was a convenient place in which to 
 keep the church treasures, or through which lepers and other 
 outcasts might receive communion. In the tower is a fine 
 peal of eight bells, but none are older than 1732. 
 
 MONUMENTS. 
 
 One would expect to find a church of such importance 
 rich in mediaeval tombs, but though there are records which 
 speak of several, they have nearly all disappeared. We 
 have to remember, however, that the parish church was 
 not the only large church in the town. It is probable that
 
 THE PARISH CHURCH. 41 
 
 great people of the place were interred as was the practice 
 in early times, in the churches of the monastic bodies ; all 
 the more so, as there are so few pre- Reformation tombs in 
 the church. With the exception of two matrices of brasses 
 in St. John's Chapel and some fragments of floriated 
 crosses in the Lady-Chapel, there is but one Gothic tomb 
 remaining, a group of two large and three small recesses, 
 with cusped and crocketed arches, in the north-west corner 
 of the north aisle, which tradition connects with the name 
 of Prince Arthur, son of Henry VII. As it is well known 
 that he died at Ludlow Castle, that when his body was em- 
 balmed and carried in great state to Worcester, the bowels 
 were buried in St. Lawrence's Church, and as the style and 
 decoration of the tomb are in accord with this date, it may 
 well be that the tradition is correct. In each of the two 
 larger recesses is a square altar-like tomb, the face highly 
 enriched with Gothic tracery-panels, the easternmost having 
 also a large Tudor rose, which ornament is prominent in the 
 decoration of Prince Arthur's tomb in Worcester Cathedral. 
 The smaller recesses are separated by semi-detached but- 
 tresses, and each contains a seat. It is possible that a 
 chantry chapel existed here, enclosed by screen-work, and 
 that the seats were intended for officiating priests, and that 
 a piscina was included in the damaged eastern portion. 
 There is no inscription, except those on later slabs which 
 have been used to repair the top, but perhaps the western- 
 most tomb is that mentioned by Leland as to " one Cokkis, 
 a gentleman servitor to Prince Arthur." On this tomb is- 
 placed every Sunday, for distribution to twelve poor widows 
 a dole of bread, which was founded by " Thomas Lane, 
 Gent, Alderman of this Corporation," in 1676, who " for 
 the Maintenance of that Charitable Gift, for ever, Devised 
 a Parcel of Land in St. John's." 
 
 The other monuments are not earlier than the reign of 
 Elizabeth, but as they follow one another in close succes- 
 sion, and most of them contain large figures, they afford an 
 interesting and instructive series for the study of costume 
 during that and the two following reigns. One of the 
 oldest is a large altar-tomb of free-stone, under an elaborate 
 Gothic arch at the far end of the chancel. It has life-size 
 effigies of a knight and lady on the top, three small ones of 
 daughters on each end, and six sons along the front. The 
 head of the knight rests on a large clasped book, on each
 
 42 LUDLOW TOWN AND NEIGHBOURHOOD. 
 
 side of which is a gauntlet, and another book in the folded 
 hands. On the head is the black skull-cap of a Chief 
 Justice. His armour is entirely plate, and early Eliza- 
 bethan in character ; the hinges and other details are very 
 clearly shown, and the sword in a singular position under 
 the body. The lady wears the French Hood, or " Paris 
 Head," a kind of close linen cap with a lappet hanging 
 down from the back. The gown is fastened by a sash at 
 the waist, and is thrown open below to display a stiff 
 petticoat embroidered with a diapered pattern. The 
 sleeves are puffed and slashed, and have small ruffs at the 
 wrists. Her feet rest on three dogs, and those of the 
 knight on a stag. The small figures on the front are 
 attired in the civilian costume of the same period. They 
 wear long open cloaks, showing the doublet buttoned 
 down the front, trunk-hose stockings, and long shoes. 
 There have been painted inscriptions under each group, but 
 the lower ones have become undecipherable through damp. 
 By very close scrutiny it can be made out that they are the 
 names of the children, with the people they married, as 
 " Amye was maride to Raffe Button, Esquire." It is a 
 pity that the early historians of Ludlow did not copy them 
 as well as the upper one, which can be read as follows : 
 " Heare lieth the Bodyes of Syr Robart Towneshend, 
 Knight, Chief Justes of the Counsell in the marches of 
 Walles and Chester, and Dame Alice his wyff, Daughter, 
 and one of the Hey res of Robert Povye, Esquire, who had 
 between them twoo XII children VI sonnes and VI 
 daughters lawfully begot." 
 
 The general design of the arch is Late Perpendicular, but 
 additions have been made to bring it more into harmony 
 with the Renaissance character of the tomb : viz., the flat 
 entablature at the top, the Towneshend arms in the recess, 
 and the family badges, the scallop and pomegranate, as 
 cusps to the arch. Previous to the Reformation this 
 recess would be used for the reception of the Easter Sepul- 
 chre, a moveable structure representing the Holy Sepulchre 
 set up just before Easter, when certain rites in commem- 
 oration of the Burial and Resurrection of our Lord were 
 observed with great ceremony. 
 
 On the south side of the chancel, under the second window 
 counting from the east, is a small altar-tomb of plain 
 classic character, and above (ingeniously combined with the
 
 THE PARISH CHURCH. 
 
 43 
 
 fifteenth century panel-work of the wall) are several coats 
 of arms disposed in hatchments, and this inscription : 
 " Heare lyeth the bodye of Ambrozia Sidney, iiij th daughter 
 
 EASTER SEPULCHRE, AND TOWNSHEND TOMB, LUDLOW CHURCH.
 
 44 LUDLOW TOWN AND NEIGHBOURHOOD. 
 
 of the Right Honourable Syr Henrye Sydney, Knight of the 
 most noble order of the Garter, Lord President of the 
 Counsell of Walles, &c., and of the Ladye Mary his wyef. 
 daughter to the famous Duke of Northumberland, who 
 dyed in Ludlow Castell ye 22nd of Februarie, 1574." The 
 poet Churchyarde, writing in the reign of Elizabeth, of this 
 tomb, says : " So to the same a closet fayre is wrought 
 where lords may sit in stately solemne wise." This was 
 probably a canopied oak pew, such as were frequently 
 erected in churches at that time, for the use of great families, 
 and of which a good example exists in the chancel at 
 Stokesay. 
 
 In the next bay towards the west is a large tomb of 
 alabaster, with a mural arch above embellished with scrolls 
 and pinnacles, and surmounted by a figure of Time, with a 
 scythe and hour-glass. There are two large effigies. The 
 male clad in civilian costume : namely, a long gown with 
 sleeves reaching nearly to the ground, and hanging down 
 from the shoulders as mere ornamental strips, with holes in 
 the upper part for the arms. Underneath it a doublet and 
 trunk-hose. The female figure shows some changes in 
 costume since the date of the Towneshend figure. The 
 hair is brushed back from the temples, and the Paris hood 
 has the lappet thrown forward over the top of the head. 
 The ornament in front of the skirts is scroll work instead of 
 a diapered pattern. On the face of the tomb are figures of 
 the sons in civilian dress, with short cloaks and long-waisted 
 doublets ; and on the two ends the daughters. The names 
 are painted above them, but a mistake has been made by 
 putting James over a daughter and Mary over a son. The 
 original iron rails are still round the tomb, with pennons at 
 the corners, perforated with the initials of the deceased. 
 Above is this inscription : " Heare lye the bodies of Ed- 
 mund Walter, Esq., Chieffe Justice of three shiers in South 
 Wales, and one of his Majestie's Councill in the Marches of 
 Wales, and of Mary his wife, daughter of Thomas Hackelvit, 
 of Eyton, Esquire, who had issue three sonnes, named 
 James, John, and Edward, and two daughters, named 
 Mary and Dorothy. He was buried the 29th day of Jan- 
 uarie, Anno Dni., 1592." 
 
 A very picturesque group on the opposite wall is the 
 memorial of the Waties family, with two quaint figures 
 under a plain lintel supported on Corinthian pilasters, and
 
 THE PARISH CHURCH. 45 
 
 a carved head in the centre. The male figure wears a 
 black cap with ornamented border, large ruff, and long red 
 gown. The lady has her head bare, ruff at the neck, tight- 
 sleeved gown, over which a long mantle with. wide short 
 sleeves. Under them is the following : " This monument 
 was erected by Edward Waties, Esquier, one of his Ma tles 
 Councell in Ordinary in the Principallity and Marches of 
 Wales, in his lief 6 time anno Aetatis suae 70, in memorial 
 of him self 6 & Martha, his late wief 6 decease d , who was 
 daughter to Sir Charles Foxe, knight, and dame Issabell, 
 his wief 6 . She departed this lief 6 the secon d day of October, 
 1629 ; they had issue between 6 them three sonnes, Charles, 
 Edward, and Timothie, and foure daughters, Margaret, 
 Issabell, Margaret & Anne, of all w ich only two are nowe 
 livinge, Margaret, the younger, who is married to Edward 
 Corbett, of Longnor, in the County of Salop, Esquier, & 
 Anne, who is married to Edward Foxe, of Ludford, in the 
 County of Hereford." 
 
 The next figure in order of date is that of Dame Margaret 
 Eure, at the end of the south transept. It shows the 
 changes in female dress which were introduced towards the 
 end of the reign of Elizabeth. The hair is drawn away 
 from the forehead, and covered by a huge calash or hood, 
 which falls a considerable distance down the back ; an 
 enormous ruff surrounds the neck, and the skirts of the 
 dress project abruptly at the hips, below the peaked 
 stomacher, being extended by the use of farthingales. The 
 figure is of alabaster, and reclines on the left elbow, instead 
 of being recumbent at full length or kneeling, as hitherto. 
 It does not now mark the burial-place of the deceased, as 
 it was removed from the chancel during the restoration. 
 At the feet is a wooden half-effigy of a man in late armour 
 and a turban. The same figure occurs as part of the coat 
 of arms above. The inscription says : " Here lyeth, ex- 
 pectinge a joyfull Resurrection, the body of Dame Mary 
 Eure, late wife to Right Hon. Ralphe Lord Eure, Baron of 
 Malton, Lord President of the principalitie and Marches of 
 Wales, & Lieutenant of the same, and Daughter of Sir 
 John Dawney, of Sessey, in the County of Yorke, knight. 
 She departed this mortal lyfe the loth day of March, Anno 
 Domini 1612, aetatis suae 55." 
 
 On the floor near the Eure monument is a slab of red 
 stone, with a border of white inlaid, inscribed and dated
 
 46 LUDLOW TOWN AND NEIGHBOURHOOD. 
 
 1617. In the centre an effigy of white stone inlaid and 
 incised with the figure of a lady, but very much worn down. 
 
 The monument in St. John's Chapel to Sir John Brydge- 
 man and his wife shows a good example of the female 
 costume prevalent during the reign of Charles I. It is a 
 large white marble altar-tomb, with two recumbent effigies. 
 The male figure is clad in a square cap and long robe. The 
 female figure has the hair in ringlets, and over it a kerchief 
 edged with a deep border of lace, a rich collar of lace round 
 the neck, full sleeves to the gown, pointed stomacher, and 
 a kind of sleeveless mantle formed in two pieces joined at 
 the shoulder, and she holds a book in her right hand. The 
 original railings still divide the tomb from the rest of the 
 chapel. At the back of the tomb is the inscription : 
 " Sacrvm Memoriae D'ni Johannis Brydgeman, Militis 
 Seruientis ad legem et capitalis Justiciariz Cestrise. Qui 
 maximo omnium bonorum mcevore (cum 70 annos vixisset), 
 5 to Febru anno 1637, P^ e Placideq ; animam Deo reddidit^ 
 Francisa Vxor moestissima posuit." Which may be 
 rendered, Sacred to the memory of Sir John Bridgman, 
 Knight, Serjeant-at-Law, and Chief Justice of Chester, 
 who, to the very great grief of all good persons (when he had 
 lived seventy years), piously and peacefully gave up his 
 soul to God on the 5th of February, 1637. Francisca, his 
 ever-sorrowing wife, erected this monument. 
 
 In the chancel is a white marble mural tomb, in the 
 classic style of the eighteenth century, with a highly finished 
 figure of a cherub seated on a collection of skulls, bones, 
 hour-glass, and other emblems, which commemorates 
 " Theophilus Salwey, Esq., who was the eldest son of 
 Edward Salwey, Esq., a younger son of Major Richard 
 Salwey, who, in the last century, sacrific'd all and every- 
 thing in his power in support of Public Liberty and in 
 opposition to Arbitrary Power. The said Theophilus 
 Salwey married Mary, the Daughter and Heiress of Robert 
 Dennet, of Walthamstow, in the County of Essex, Esq. r 
 but left no issue by her. Obiit the 28th day of April, 1700, 
 aet. 61. Pro Rege Saepe : Pro Republica Semper."
 
 PLAN OF THE TOWN, SHOWING THE OLD WALL.
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 THE TOWN. 
 
 Remains of the Monasteries The College The Grammar School 
 Barnaby House Dinham Chapel The Town Wall Broad 
 Gate Gaol Butter Cross Corporation Maces Civic 
 Buildings Domestic Architecture Almshouses The Museum. 
 
 THE remaining interest in the town itself is chiefly in the 
 relics which connect it with the remote past, most of them 
 remains of ecclesiastical military, civic, or domestic archi- 
 tecture. 
 
 Of the ecclesiastical, the monastery of the Carmelites has 
 .already been mentioned. The existing fragments are a 
 few carved heads in the wall of the burial-ground of St. 
 Leonard's Church, which now occupies the site, the old 
 font therein, and an old arch in the lane called Linney, 
 which runs from the lower end of Corve Street towards the 
 castle. This arch is of the transitional period from 
 Norman to Early English. Leland spoke of the building 
 .as a fair and costly thing, without Corv-gate by north, 
 nearly at the end of the suburb. Laurence de Ludlow is 
 said, in one of Stow's MS., to have been the founder, about 
 1349.* The site was granted in the 2nd of Elizabeth to 
 R. Hackett and Thomas Trentham. There is an inventory 
 of the goods temp. Henry VIII. in the Chapter House, 
 Westminster. The Carmelites, or White Friars, took the 
 first name from the place of their first residence, and the 
 second from the colour of their habit. They were driven 
 from Mount Carmel, in 1098, by the Saracens. The Austin 
 Friars also possessed a large monastery on the slope below 
 Goalford,f on the site of the Cattle Market. The founda- 
 tions were uncovered when the latter was made, and plans 
 were taken of them ; but no visible traces exist except the 
 fish-ponds, now empty. Leland says : " Without Goalford 
 -Gate stood the house of Austin Friars, who had seated 
 themselves there before 1282." The Priory was granted to 
 
 * The word Founder was often used in the sense of patron. 
 Laurence could hardly have been the first founder, from the early 
 -Character of the arch. 
 
 f Now spelt Galdeford.
 
 THE TOWN. 49 
 
 Geo. Cotton and William Man, in the ist year of Mary. 
 These friars had a white garment and scapulary when in the 
 house, over which, when in the choir or abroad, they wore 
 a cowl or large hood, both black, and black leathern girdle. 
 
 There was also a Hospital of St. John the Baptist on the 
 river-side below Ludford Bridge. The name survives in St. 
 John's Close, and the ruin of a fulling mill under the top 
 side of the bridge* is a relic of their property. Leland 
 says: " On the North syde of the brydge, in ripa sinistra 
 Teme, a Church of St. John standing without Broad Gate, 
 some time a College with a Dean and fellows, of one Jordan's 
 foundation." This seems to be, says Tanner, " the 
 Hospital for a Prior, Warden, or Master, which one, Peter 
 Undergod, in the latter end of the reign of John, built to the 
 honour of the Trinity, St. Mary, and St. John the Baptist, 
 valued at the dissolution at 13 33. 3d. The Warden and 
 brethren ought, as it is sayd, to discharge ye cure and say 
 divine service in ye king's chapell of Saynt Peter within ye 
 Castell of Ludlow." 
 
 The list of religious bodies of mediaeval Ludlow is com- 
 pleted with the Brotherhood of the Palmer's Guild. 
 
 Their College is a plain modernised building at the 
 west of the church having a Perpendicular oak gateway 
 and some panelled rooms. At the back are some remains 
 of stone buildings, covering a considerable space, most of 
 which are not earlier than the fifteenth century; but one 
 large window, now hidden by decaying sheds, at the back 
 of Church Street, is a capital example of Early Decorated 
 work, and of great interest as attesting the importance 
 and extent of the College. The old house adjoining on the 
 north, known as the old rectory, has also been lately reno- 
 vated ; and, on the removal of the plastering, it could be 
 seen that the door, though ancient and retaining its old 
 iron-work, was under and at one side of a much larger stone 
 pointed arch, which can still be seen. The intervening 
 space was filled up with stonework, and timber framing, 
 and in the latter, at the top of the door, was a good window 
 with moulded oak mullions, now removed. There was 
 another window uncovered in the lower part of the wall, 
 which presumably still remains, and has an ogee head, 
 shutter hinges, and other signs of being coeval with it. 
 
 * The remains of this mill were swept away in the recent disastrous 
 flood (1886).
 
 50 LUDLOW TOW\ AND NEIGHBOURHOOD. 
 
 These evidences of alteration in the Tudor period are most 
 interesting, especially as in this case illustrating an import- 
 ant episode in the history of the town namely, the dis- 
 solution of the guild, and the application of its property 
 through new channels to works of religion and education. 
 Doubtless, at this time the college buildings were altered to 
 suit new requirements ; and we have in the Gothic masonry 
 and Tudor additions a record of this. It would have been 
 most interesting, as well as picturesque, if the ancient door 
 and window had been retained, and I tried during the 
 recent alterations to save them, but without avail. That 
 part of the ground floor, lighted by the ogee-headed window, 
 was divided by heavy oak framework, with pointed door- 
 ways of the same date. 
 
 That this was an important edifice we know from the 
 notes of Leland, who speaks of it and its owners thus : 
 " This church hath beene muche advanced by a brotherhood 
 therein founded, in the name of St. John the Evangelist. 
 The Originall thereof was (as the people say there) in the 
 tyme of King Edward the Confessor, and it is constantly 
 affirmed there that the Pilgrims that brought the Ringe 
 from beyond the Sea as a token from St. John the Evange- 
 list to K. Edward were the inhabitants of Ludlowe. This 
 Fraternity hath a Guardian chosen annually amonge the 
 Burgesses, and to this College belonge now a ten Priests 
 partly found by endowment of Landes, partly by Gather- 
 inge the Devotion of the People about there. And these 
 Priests have a fayre house at the West end of the Paroche 
 Churche yard, and by it an Hospitall or almshouse for 30 
 poore Folkes for the most part, and sometimes more, main- 
 tained partly by the Fraternity and partly by mony given 
 for Obbits of men buried there in the Churche." 
 
 When we turn to its early history for confirmation of 
 this claim to date from the time of Edward the Confessor 
 (which would assume a town here in Saxon times, which 
 Mr. Eyton thinks probable), we find it misty and confused, 
 but still affording a distinct clue to such a society from a 
 time not far short of that. The documents which still exist 
 would themselves fill a large volume. The earliest is date- 
 less and mutilated, but it has been demonstrated by 
 laborious research to be as early as Henry III. or John, and 
 in it there is evidence of the existence of a former guild. 
 In the early years of the reign of Edward I., the guild
 
 THE TOWN. 51 
 
 obtained formal recognition, and in the Patent Rolls of 
 Edward III. is a mention of the application, and its being 
 granted by Edward I. In these Letters Patent the guild is 
 spoken of as having existed " ab antique." Besides these 
 facts in support of the claim, the name itself is difficult to 
 explain by any other theory, and is known to have dis- 
 tinguished the Fraternity from a very early time. In the 
 will of William de la Vilde, 1317, is the following passage : 
 " Item lego fraternitati St. Andre de ludlowe quae vocatur 
 palmar gylde." 
 
 Not included in the general Dissolution of Henry VIII., 
 it was in the reign of Edward VI. surrendered to the Crown 
 on condition of being handed over to the Corporation for 
 the same charitable ends to which it had been always 
 applied. The manuscripts relating to this transaction are 
 preserved among the town records ; they extend over several 
 years, but eventually the fee farm " of all suche burgages, 
 mesuages, lands, tenementes, wooddes, and all other heri- 
 ditaments what soe ever " belonging to " the guylde or 
 fraternitie of palmers of our Ladye in Ludlow," the 
 " warden, brythern, and sisterne of the sayd guylde being 
 contented to surrender unto the Kinge's majestie's handes," 
 were granted to " the bayliffes, burgessis, and commonal- 
 tie," with the condition that they " alwayes finde in the 
 same towne, at their own charges, a free grammar schole, 
 with a schoolmaster and an hussher for the erudicion of 
 youth in the Latine tonge, and also xxxiij poore and im- 
 potent people, every one of them to have a chamber and 
 iiij s a week, and alsoe on honeste learned man to preache 
 Goddes woord, which shall be named the preacher of the 
 towne of Ludlowe, and on honeste and discrete minister to 
 assist the parson in the ministracion of the devine sacra- 
 mentes and service there, wich shall be called the assistant 
 to the parson." 
 
 THE GRAMMAR SCHOOL. 
 
 In the fifth year of Edward VI., 1552, a new charter was 
 granted, which states that a Grammar School had been 
 maintained by the Guild and provides, among other things, 
 that the " issues and profits of their premises should keep 
 and continue the said Grammar School." There is a par- 
 ticular of the Guild estate attached to the grant, which
 
 LUDLOW TOWN AND NEIGHBOURHOOD. 
 
 THE GRAMMAR SCHOOL, FROM MILL STREET, LUDLOW. 
 
 gives the gross income as 121 35. nirf., but no means 
 exist of identifying the actual property. The present 
 income handsomely provides for a head master, second 
 master, and writing master, and there are several exhibitions 
 of value, open to boys of the district. The building itself 
 stands in the lower part of Mill Street, and is very interest- 
 ing. Its evident antiquity bears out the documentary 
 evidence of its existence much earlier than the charter of 
 Edward VI. Except the one at King's Norton, part of 
 which is believed to be fourteenth century, there are 
 probably few other instances of a grammar school so old
 
 THE TOWN. 53 
 
 either in fabric or foundation. The schoolroom, which 
 faces the road, is a stone building with a large pointed 
 door, and on its upper side two fourteenth century windows 
 of two lights, having the heads cusped, and on the lower 
 side is a modern copy of them. In the roof are five large 
 dormers, which give light to a dormitory, and on the garden 
 side are two more fourteenth century windows, like those 
 facing the street, but having only one light. Near them is 
 another door opposite and similar to the first. The lower 
 part of the walls is panelled with Jacobean oak, which is 
 carved above by the original maker and below by genera- 
 tions of mischievous school-boys. The turret and windows 
 under it are modern. There was a wooden bell-turret in 
 the centre of the roof in 1800, but it was destroyed, when 
 the present was erected and the south end modernised. 
 
 BARNABY HOUSE. 
 
 A little below the Grammar School, parallel to and just 
 within the old Town Wall, is a row of buildings of grey- 
 stone, much time-worn, and now divided into several tene- 
 ments. Some years ago it was used as a silk-mill, and gave 
 to the lane the name it still bears. But it has a much more 
 considerable antiquity, as a close inspection will show. 
 The side towards the lane bears evidence of having been 
 much altered, especially the window openings, but there is 
 high up a long opening like a doorway now bricked up 
 with a shouldered arch in the head, which is thirteenth 
 century. The end towards Mill Street was last used as a 
 stable ; in it there is a large fireplace with moulded side- 
 stones and corbelled-head. From the loft over this can be 
 seen the fine timber framework of the roof, divided by large 
 beams into compartments which are trefoiled in each end. 
 In the garden front the walls are very thick and solid, of 
 limestone rubble, with large quoins of sandstone. There is 
 here an Early English window, and near it a corbelled-out 
 projection ; also a large door of the same period, with 
 shouldered head. 
 
 This edifice was no doubt part of one which was called 
 Barnaby House, and in medieval times served as a resting- 
 place for pilgrims, of which there were great numbers 
 passed through Ludlow on their way to the Well of St. 
 Winifred at Holywell, in Wales.
 
 54 LUDLOW TOWN AND NEIGHBOURHOOD. 
 
 DINHAM CHAPEL. 
 
 Just within Dinham Gate stands a small chapel, now ivy- 
 covered, and surmounted by a wooden turret, having been 
 converted into a coach-house. Scarcely anything is known 
 of its history, and it is not easy to decide what was its plan 
 or extent, as only the chancel remains, but it seems very 
 likely that the nave extended over the Town Gate, which 
 was not an unusual arrangement. The chancel-arch, now 
 fitted with large doors, is the entrance, and is of simple and 
 very Early English character, with plain imposts ; and 
 there is a similar one nearly as large in the north wall, but 
 built up, as is a small doorway under it. This chancel was 
 vaulted with stone, and the ribs remain entire, springing 
 from corbels in the four angles, only a short distance from 
 the floor, though the vault is lofty. On the south side are 
 several apertures, which it is difficult to understand ; one of 
 them has externally a Norman look. The recess of a large 
 east window remains with, perhaps, tracery, but there is a 
 stable built against it. 
 
 MILITARY AND CIVIC REMAINS. 
 
 The only military remains, except the castle, are the 
 town fortifications, unless we include a building in Goalford, 
 which was reconstructed as a gaol from the ruins of an 
 ancient tower in 1754. The Town Wall can be traced 
 throughout its length, and will be best understood from the 
 plan. In many places it is still of considerable height and 
 well preserved, though of the five gates only one remains. 
 In Frog Lane there is a considerable length of the town 
 ditch under the wall, cultivated as a garden to an old alms- 
 house at the corner of Old Street. At this point, Old Gate 
 crossed the street, and was entire within living memory. 
 Broad Gate, at the other end of Frog Lane, the name of 
 which no doubt comes from its proximity to the moat, has 
 been tampered with at various times, and both sides en- 
 crusted with houses, but still shows considerable strength, 
 standing massive and grim across the street, whose great 
 breadth it reduces to a narrow arched passage. The two 
 semi-circular towers of stone with bricked-up loop-holes are 
 probably late mediaeval work, but the heavy pointed arch 
 within, with its portcullis groove and gate hinges, is of the
 
 THE TOWN. 
 
 55 
 
 fourteenth century at least. The brick arches at either end 
 of the gateway passage are comparatively modern, as are 
 most of the windows. 
 
 The other gates were in Dinham, Linney, Corve Street, 
 and Goalford. There was also one at the bottom of Mill 
 Street, but probably only a postern for the Town Mill. The 
 road from Dinham Bridge approaches the town through a 
 narrow passage between high rubble walls, and at its upper 
 end was Dinham Gate, which is mentioned in the thirteenth 
 century, and remained till 1786. At the north-west angle 
 of the churchyard, was Linney Gate, the door- jambs of 
 which were recently discovered during repairs. The 
 position of Corve Gate, at the top of the street of that name, 
 is easily traced by the sudden widening of the street on the 
 outer side of it. At the back of the Feathers Hotel, on the 
 east side of the street, is a ruined tower, placed so as to 
 strengthen the wall on this side, where the natural defences 
 were weakest. There is a similar tower overgrown with 
 weeds on the river side of the wall, above Mill Street. 
 
 The Old Gaol is a plain Georgian building of stone. The 
 following inscription was on the large stone over the doorway : 
 ' This building was erected at the charge of the Corporation, 
 MDCCLIV., in the fourth year of King George III., for the 
 Common Prison of the town, in the place of Goalford's 
 Tower ; an ancient Prison and Gate, by length of time
 
 56 LUDLOW TOWN AND NEIGHBOURHOOD. 
 
 become ruinous." The only remains of the earlier building 
 are two ancient doors, which may have been part of the 
 Gate. Considering its ancient corporate history, the civic 
 buildings of Ludlow are disappointing. The best is the 
 Butter Cross, at the top of Broad Street, which, though not 
 more than about two centuries old, is a very quaint building, 
 and from some points quite a picturesque one. It was no 
 doubt built on the site of a more ancient Market Cross, 
 such as still exists at Cheddar and Salisbury. A good 
 feature is the clock turret, in which is a bell stated to have 
 belonged to the Chapel of St. Leonard ; but there is no 
 evidence of this, and if it did, it must have been re-cast, as 
 the inscription is " All Prayse and Glory to God for ever- 
 more, 1684," and the bells at St. Leonard's were (at any 
 rate, originally) much older. The lower story forms a 
 shelter for market people, and the upper has a chamber 
 used for Sunday School and similar purposes. In it the 
 Corporation, in accordance with an ancient custom, meet 
 on Sunday mornings, and march, with the Mayor at their 
 head, and preceded by two mace-bearers in black gowns, 
 into church and up the nave to the pew set apart for their 
 use. This procession has a very picturesque effect, which is 
 much enhanced by contrast with another one of surpliced 
 choristers and clergy, which, starting from the far end of the 
 chancel at the same moment, streams slowly down the 
 choir, to the solemn accompaniment of the organ. 
 
 The ancient maces used in this ceremony are a part 
 of the Corporation insignia, which, though not so old as that 
 of some towns, is very handsome, and much of it the same 
 metal as is found recorded as far back as 1594, but melted 
 down and re-worked into other designs. Besides the three 
 maces, there are four silver tankards, two salvers, and two 
 tobacco-boxes of the same metal. The maces have large 
 crowns at the top and the town and royal arms on a boss, 
 which is bracketed out from the stem, round which in each 
 case are three ornamental bands at intervals. The design 
 of the two smaller ones differs from the larger one, and 
 they are older, having the letters P R for James II., on the 
 occasion of whose visit they were bought. The great 
 mace, which is 3 ft. 4^ in. long, was the gift of an ancestor 
 of the Salwey family. The inscription on the knob at the 
 bottom is, " D.D. Johanns Sal way Armiger unus ex alder- 
 manis villae de Ludlow 1692," Two of the tankards are
 
 THE TOWN. 
 
 57 
 
 LUDLOW CORPORATION INSIGNIA. 
 
 rather small, and are ornamented with the town arms. They 
 have massive lids, and were acquired in 1677 and 1680. 
 The larger ones have more ornamental lids, and the lion 
 couchant-guardant of the town arms forming part of the 
 hinge. They were made in 1718, as also were the salvers, 
 which are rather shallow, and have the Ludlow arms. 
 
 The Market, or Corn Exchange, in the Castle Square, is 
 a Queen Anne building of red brick, not what architects call 
 Queen Anne, but the actual work of that reign, and a very 
 meagre and unprepossessing edifice, though not without 
 character.* 
 
 The Guildhall, a red-brick building in Mill Street, is used 
 as a Police Court, and for Quarter Sessions. It was 
 erected in 1768, on the site of a former one of that name, 
 belonging to the Palmers' Guild. 
 
 DOMESTIC ARCHITECTURE. 
 
 Domestic architecture is well represented, the best 
 example being the celebrated Feathers Hotel, one of the 
 * Since taken down.
 
 58 LUDLOW TOWN AND NEIGHBOURHOOD. 
 
 finest houses of its type in the country. Its exterior no 
 visitor will be likely to miss, but parts of the interior are 
 equally good, and he would do well, even if a teetotaller, 
 to visit them. In the coffee-room the ceiling is divided by 
 moulded beams into three compartments, which are most 
 elaborately wrought and filled with intricate ornament. 
 The carved oak mantel-piece is said to have come from the 
 castle, but whether or not, it harmonizes admirably with 
 the beautiful ceiling and rich panelling of its present 
 
 THE FEATHERS HOTEL, LUDLOW.
 
 THE TOWN. 59 
 
 quarters. Its most prominent feature is the royal coat of 
 arms, with the letters I. R. for Jacobus Rex, with bold arches 
 and pilasters flanked by grotesque figures on each side. 
 The adjoining room has good panelling, and the Foxe arms 
 on a carved panel over the door.* Externally the house 
 is a striking group of overhanging gables of timber and 
 plaster, the timbers disposed in various quaint patterns, 
 and richly carved. There is a tradition that the house 
 was built by one Jones, which may account for the initials 
 R.I. on the picturesque lock-plate of the front door. 
 There are many houses of this kind in the town, though 
 most of them are plastered over, and otherwise disfigured 
 and concealed. Perhaps the next best is that known as 
 the Reader's House, in the churchyard, chiefly of stone, 
 with a projection of timber and plaster in the front 
 face, and the back and ends of the same material. The 
 projection is treated with considerable elaboration, and 
 the lower portion, which forms a porch, has much bold 
 carving.f The inner and outer doors are also very good. 
 The row of houses at the top of Broad Street, which project 
 over the footpath, is the old Butcher Row, and contains 
 some good old work ; but the whole, with one exception, 
 plastered over. There are some fine old houses in Church 
 Street, one of which has some good carved panelling and a 
 bold inscription. In High Street is a fine and elaborate 
 ceiling of the time of Queen Anne. In the Bull Ring a 
 barge board is carved to represent a hunting scene, and 
 there are one or two good nouses there : one fine one in 
 Dinham, and a few at the lower end of Corve Street. The 
 statement is often made that the groups of houses which 
 now stand in the midst of the Bull Ring are modern 
 additions, and that when the old pastime of bull-baiting 
 prevailed the whole area was open. This is not the case, 
 as the isolated houses are quite as old as those round the 
 sides, and in a walled town space would be too valuable to 
 use for such a purpose. Certainly bull-baiting has been 
 practised as much since the erection of the houses as 
 before. 
 
 * The arms are, a chevron between three foxes' heads erased 
 (Foxe), impaled with three hatchets proper (Hackeluit). On each 
 side of the shield is a panel with a late example of the water -bouget. 
 In the absence of any history of the house, these arms are of great 
 interest, as connecting it with two ancient families of the district. 
 
 f See illustration, page 26.
 
 60 LUDLOW TOWN AND NEIGHBOURHOOD. 
 
 ALMSHOUSES. 
 
 About half-way down Old Street, at the corner of Frog 
 Lane, a very fine old house of timber and plaster, with a 
 stone basement, is delightful both in form and colour. It 
 is an almshouse for old women, and was founded in 1674 
 by one Thos. Lane, who had been a servant to Sir Job 
 Charlton. He left a sum of mimey in trust to the Charlton 
 family, with which the present house, which had been 
 granted by the Corporation, and was already old, was 
 repaired and furnished. At the beginning of the century it 
 was known as the Workhouse, and behind it a small prison 
 or cell, as the House of Correction " for securing vagrants 
 and other petty delinquents." 
 
 In the dining-room is an old coat of arms, quartering 
 France and England, surrounded by the Garter, and having 
 as supporters the Lion and Dragon. It is surmounted by 
 a crown and the initials E.R. It is probably the coat of 
 Elizabeth ; but as she generally quartered Wales and 
 Ireland, too, it might be that of Edward VI., with whose 
 arms and supporters it corresponds. 
 
 Near the modern church of St. Leonard, in Corve Street, 
 is another almshouse, a long low building of stone, with 
 the Foxe arms, and date 1593. Charles Foxe, of Brom- 
 field, by his will of same date, left the land and chapel 
 which he had purchased, and which were a part of the 
 property of the White Friars for the use of the occupants 
 of four almshouses which he had begun to build there. He 
 also provided a stipend for the curate of Ludford, to read 
 Divine Service every Wednesday and Friday, and every 
 Sunday and festival day in the year, and he gave two 
 bells, which he had in his sollar at Bromfield, to be hanged 
 up in the steeple of the chapel.* - In the middle of the last 
 century the trust of this charity had descended to two 
 infants, Henry and James Foxe, who were educated 
 abroad, and during their minority the charity was badly 
 neglected, and the chapel allowed to get out of repair. In 
 1769, James Foxe, there being no issue of the family of the 
 testator, and he living remote from the place, conveyed to 
 the Corporation the whole premises. In 1759 the tiling 
 was taken off the roof, " as it being in so ruinous a manner 
 as rendered it a great nuisance, and very unsafe to pas- 
 * He had been granted the manor of Bromfield Priory.
 
 THE TOWN. 61 
 
 sengers." In 1773 the roof of the church was taken down, 
 and the timber sold for 12 6s. 8d., and there are records 
 of sums paid in that year during the process of destruction, 
 as " 5 75. iod., for four waggon-load of stone tile, and 
 two waggon-load of brick tile, 260 laths," and " two 
 dozen crests, and another for timber and iron bars from the 
 chancel put in the charity school." One of the bells is 
 said, without known authority, to be now placed over the 
 Butter Cross. The walls of the chapel remained standing 
 till the end of the century, the land being leased to Mr. 
 Acton for 99 years at a rent of /I i6s. 
 
 From the above it almost seems as if the almshouse 
 chapel was the church of the Carmelite Friary, but if only 
 a subordinate chapel, the monastery must have been a very 
 important structure. The chapel had a chancel and a 
 steeple, with room for several bells, and must have been 
 large, from the quantity of tiles, and from the sum obtained 
 for the decayed roof timbers, and it must have stood near 
 the street, as the loose tiles were dangerous to passengers. 
 
 The conduct of the Corporation with respect to this 
 charity caused much dissatisfaction in the town their 
 having pulled down the chapel, which it was one of the 
 objects of the charity to " preserve and perpetuate," when 
 the inhabitants were in want of church room and burial- 
 ground ; that the value of the materials was not accounted 
 for, and the long lease of the chapel land granted by the 
 Corporation to one of their own body, were causes of com- 
 plaint. On the expiration of this lease the modern church 
 was erected. 
 
 THE MUSEUM. 
 
 A group of buildings at the corner of Mill Street and the 
 Castle Square, called the Assembly Rooms, contains a 
 large room for balls and meetings, a reading room and 
 entered from Mill Street the Museum of the Ludlow 
 Natural History Society. It contains a very fine collection 
 of Silurian fossils, a large and well-preserved collection of 
 birds, and many relics from the castle, church, and monas- 
 teries of the town. There are also a number of the munici- 
 pal charters and records of the greatest interest. The 
 documents of the Guild of Hammermen the last of the 
 Ludlow trade guilds in the original seventeenth century
 
 62 LUDLOW TOWN AND NEIGHBOURHOOD. 
 
 oak chests, have recently been presented by the oldest 
 surviving member of the guild,* and are of great value in 
 throwing light on the commercial history of the town. 
 There is a very fine old iron-bound chest with rude Gothic 
 ornament. Over the doorway is a relic of an extraordinary 
 old custom which was kept up within living memory in the 
 town : viz., the two ends, with large wooden balls attached, 
 of a large rope, with which the following ceremony was 
 gone through : On Shrove Tuesday, the rope, which was 
 three inches in circumference and thirty-nine yards long, 
 was given out at one of the windows of the Market Hall at 
 four o'clock, and two parties of townsmen, one representing 
 Castle Street and Broad Street Wards, and the other for 
 Old Street and Corve Street Wards, took the ends of it, and 
 each tried to drag the other across the town, the Broad 
 Street party trying to dip their end in the Teme, and the 
 Corve Street theirs in the Corve. 
 
 * Mr. Thomas Cook, late of Old Street. 
 
 ARMS IN LANE S HOSPITAL.
 
 LUDFORD BRIDGE FROM THE FOOT OF WHITCLIFF. 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 LUDFORD. 
 
 Ludford Bridge Village Church Monuments to the Foxes 
 and Charltons Ludford House St. Giles' Almshouse 
 Whitcliff. 
 
 From the Broad Gate, the street descends steeply 
 though not so steeply as it did when defence was more 
 important than convenience to the River Teme, where the 
 ancient bridge of Ludford still spans the rocky and shelving 
 bed of the stream, as it has stood for seven centuries ; for 
 though its claims to such antiquity are not yet recognised, 
 and it sounds almost too good to be true, I think there can 
 be no doubt that it is a Norman bridge. The enormous 
 bulk of its weedy and rugged piers, together with the 
 character of the semi-circular ribbed arches, and the 
 regularity of its square and solid masonry, all point to this 
 conclusion. But apart from the evidence of the bridge 
 itself, it is known from the charter of the Hospital of St. 
 John, now in the British Museum (which hospital stood 
 near on the Ludlow side), that a bridge existed here in the
 
 6 4 
 
 LUDLOW TOWN AND NEIGHBOURHOOD. 
 
 reign of John. In the Fitz Warine romance, written early 
 in the thirteenth century, is the passage : " This Joce de 
 Dinan caused to be made below the town of Dynan a 
 bridge of stone and lime, over the river of Temede into the 
 high road which goes through the March from Chester to 
 
 LUDFORD BRIDGE FROM BELOW. 
 
 Bristol." Joce was castellan of Ludlow in the reign of 
 Stephen. It is also mentioned in other thirteenth century 
 documents. About the middle of the sixteenth century 
 Leland speaks of it thus : " There be three fayre arches 
 in this bridge over Teme, and a pretty chapel upon it of 
 St. Catherine. It is about a hundred years since this stone 
 bridge was erected. Men passed afore by a ford a little 
 below the bridge." This need not affect its claim to a 
 greater age ; it may even be taken as confirmatory, because 
 he evidently speaks of the first bridge there erected, and we 
 know there was one there in the reign of John ; also be- 
 cause if the bridge was one hundred years old then, it was
 
 LUDFORD. 65 
 
 probably three hundred, for the builders of it would be very 
 unlikely to have used round arches at any time later than 
 that. 
 
 The chapel stood on the pier nearest to Broad Street, 
 and was well preserved in 1772. In other respects the 
 bridge is untouched, except by the beautifying finger of 
 Time, and there are few things in this interesting county 
 more worthy of study by the traveller, the artist, or the 
 archaeologist.* Close under it, on the upper side, is a 
 ruined stone building, f through which the river flows, and 
 which was the fulling mill given by Peter Undergod to the 
 above mentioned hospital on its foundation by him, in the 
 reign of John. 
 
 In the deep recesses of the old bridge, safe from passing 
 wheels, very delightful is the view looking up stream. Tall 
 trees almost hide the rocky bank on the one hand, and on 
 the other, besides the fulling mill, some old tanneries, and 
 a flour-mill are supplied by a shattered old weir, over 
 which the river foams and boils, and below it, slides over 
 shallow shelves of rocks and beds of loose stones. The 
 quiet pool above shows with perfect reflection the steep 
 grey sides of the white cliff, honeycombed with quarries, 
 and festooned with brown vegetation, except where, at one 
 point, the tail-water of some higher mill rushing in makes 
 a space of rippling light. Below bridge, the view is quite 
 different, but hardly less lovely ; the river widens out into 
 a large pool, closed in on the right by a tree-covered bank, 
 on which is a fine half-timber house, and supported by a 
 V-shaped weir to supply flour-mills on either side. Both 
 mills are ancient, built with all kinds of materials, and over- 
 hang the water in the most picturesque fashion, adding 
 greatly to the beauty of the scene ; between them a dis- 
 tant reach of river flowing through banks covered with 
 trees. 
 
 LUDFORD VILLAGE. 
 
 Ludford is the name of the village on the opposite bank 
 of the stream, and is doubtless so called from the ancient 
 
 * Since the above was written the disastrous flood of 1886 has 
 damaged the lower portion of the bridge, necessitating repairs, which 
 have, unfortunately been extended to vhe upper portion, in an 
 attempt to make it look like a new one. 
 
 | This was swept away by the flood. 
 
 E
 
 66 LUDLOW TOWN AND NEIGHBOURHOOD. 
 
 THE TEME FROM THE WHITCLIFF QUARRIES. 
 
 ford which existed just below the two mills at the bottom 
 of Old Street, before the bridge was built. It now lies 
 away from the main road, and is a quaint and interesting 
 nook, and well worth lingering over. Passing through the 
 iron gate into the churchyard, its principal features are well 
 seen, church, manor-house, almshouses, and mill, all ancient. 
 On ascending the path, the first view of the church, with its 
 ivy-covered walls, quaint barge-boards, and magnificent 
 churchyard trees, and the well-grouped gables and chimneys 
 of Ludford House beyond, is very striking, and raises hopes 
 which a closer inspection hardly sustains. For the windows 
 are filled with new glass in large sheets, and the entire south 
 wall has been rebuilt. Originally Norman, it has under- 
 gone many alterations, and now consists of nave, tower, 
 chancel, and north transept. The Norman nave was a 
 plain, oblong, without tower or transept. This is shown 
 by the original west wall, with its Norman window, and the 
 fifteenth century tower built against it. The windows of 
 the nave are all modern, but the holy water stoup indicates 
 the position of the old south door, now gone. The chancel 
 arch is obtusely pointed ; above it two trefoil-headed
 
 LUDFORD. 67 
 
 windows have been pierced. On the south side of the 
 chancel is a small fourteenth century window, with a piscina 
 projecting from its sill, which show it to have been 
 cut from a Norman capital, with remains of sunk 
 star moulding. The transept, or Foxe Chapel, opens 
 out of the nave by a large semi-circular arch, and out 
 of the chancel by a round-headed opening obliquely cut 
 through the wall. At the first glance these two arches 
 appear to be Norman, but a closer examination shows that 
 only the capitals of the larger one have any Norman 
 character. The responds and arch mouldings are of the 
 semi-octagon type common in the fifteenth and sixteenth 
 centuries. It would seem that the statement on the brass 
 to William Foxe is correct, that he was " founder of this 
 ile adjeyning unto this churche." He died in 1554, and it 
 seems likely that he re-used the fourteenth century window 
 now in the east wall, and two Norman capitals found in the 
 course of his alterations. All the other features of the 
 " ile," viz., two small windows, and the large one on the 
 north with square head, and three lights crossed by a tran- 
 som, would agree with the above date. Above the latter, 
 on the outside, are these arms on a stone shield : quarterly 
 1st and 4th argent, a chevron between three foxes' heads, 
 erased gules, for Foxe. Second quarterly first and fourth 
 on a bend, three dolphins embowed or : which arms also 
 appear on the drip-stone terminations. 
 
 The brass above mentioned is the earliest tomb. It is a 
 large blue slab, now upright against the wall between the 
 two arches, with engraved, effigies to William Foxe and his 
 wife, an inscription, and two groups of sons and daughters, 
 and at the corners four coats of arms. The knight is clad 
 in plate armour of the early part of the sixteenth century, 
 but with collar and apron of chain mail. The wife has the 
 kennel or pedimental head-dress, and tight-fitting gown ; 
 suspended from the waist by a chain is the pomander box. 
 The inscription is : " Here undernethe this stone lyeth ye 
 Bodye of Wyllyam Foxe of Ludlowe, yn the Countye of 
 Salop, Esquier, and ffounder of thys Ile adjeyning vnto this 
 Churche, and which Wyllyam reedefyed the Almes Howse of 
 Seynt Gyles beying decayed, and also- Jane, hys wyff, 
 Daughter and heyre of Richard Downe, of Ludlowe, afor- 
 seyd which Wyllyam Decessyd the XXIII rd daye of Aprill, 
 Anno dni M.C.CC.CCLIIII, and the seyd Jane decessyd
 
 68 LUDLOW TOWN AND NEIGHBOURHOOD. 
 
 the day A. dni M.C.C.C.C.C, 
 
 on whose soules Jhu have Mercy." This tomb is an 
 interesting illustration of the Roman Catholic revival in the 
 reign of Mary. It was probably erected by the wife, whose 
 executors neglected to fill in the date of her death. 
 
 The next is a quaint altar-tomb against the east wall of 
 the " ile," with two blank shields, and a rectangular piece 
 of white stone inlaid in the upper slab, which is supported 
 on eight plain columns. Round its margin is the following : 
 " Expecting a joyfull resurrection heare lyeth the bodies of 
 Edwarde Foxe, of Ludforde, Esq., who died the and 
 
 Jane his wife, who deceased the ." Having 
 
 been erected in their lifetime, the dates have never been 
 filled in, but it is plainly a work of the earlier part of the 
 seventeenth century. 
 
 In the north-west corner is an altar-tomb flanked with 
 Ionic columns, on which is a full-length effigy of Sir Job- 
 Charlton, in the scarlet robe and black skull-cap of a judge. 
 On a mural continuation of the tomb is a long Latin in- 
 scription, which speaks of him as Chief Justice of Chester, 
 Speaker of the House of Commons, and Justice of the 
 King's Bench, and as dying in 1697. Near the last is a 
 mural monument, with a good bust and an extremely quaint 
 inscription in English, but too long for quotation, to 
 Dorothy, wife of Sir Job, who died 1658. There is also 
 another mural monument to his second wife. There are a 
 number of fine old tiles in this chapel, but it is mostly paved 
 with grave-stones. 
 
 LUDFORD HOUSE. 
 
 The earlier history of Ludford House is not very weir 
 known, but it is recorded that a house stood here as early 
 as the twelfth century. In the reign of William the 
 Conqueror, the manor belonged to Osborn Fitz Richard, 
 lord of Richard's castle. In the reign of John, Peter 
 Undergod founded the Hospital of St. John the Baptist, 
 before mentioned, and gave to it all his lands in Ludford. 
 At the dissolution, the manor, being seized by the Crown,, 
 was granted to John, Earl of Warwick, of whom it was 
 purchased by William Foxe. It is stated to have been 
 bought in 1607 by Sir Job Charlton, of Whitton Court ;* 
 * Wright's " History of Ludlow," 1852.
 
 LUDFORD. 69 
 
 but this must be an error, as the date of his death on his 
 tomb is 1697, and the apparent date of the second Foxe 
 tomb is later than 1607 ; moreover, Edward Foxe of 
 Ludford was Sheriff of Shropshire in 1608. This Sir Job 
 seems to have been of a convivial disposition, the fame of 
 his entertainments being widespread. Among other great 
 people, King James II. enjoyed his hospitality at Ludford. 
 In 1732, Edmund Lechmere, of Hanley Castle, Worcester- 
 shire, married the daughter of Sir Blundell Charlton, through 
 whom Ludford has descended to John Lechmere M. Parkin- 
 son, Esq., its present owner. 
 
 The house is very large, built round a quadrangle, and 
 is chiefly timber and plaster of the Tudor period, but some 
 of it, notably that side facing the churchyard, is built upon 
 a first storey of great thickness. Probably when William 
 Foxe bought the manor, the hospital had here buildings of 
 greater or less importance which he incorporated in the 
 one we see at the present day, Tudorizing at the same 
 time the existing windows. This is conjectural, of course, 
 but nothing seems so well to explain the extraordinary mass 
 of masonry and timber known as Ludford House. The 
 side towards the road, in which is the principal entrance 
 under a pointed arch, is chiefly rubble masonry, and rather 
 heavy and gloomy. In the other portions there is more 
 variety, and the side next the churchyard is exceedingly 
 picturesque, with several bold projections and fine groups 
 of chimneys ; in one of the former, a room over the porch 
 is the Oratory, a place for prayer and meditation, from 
 which is a secret passage believed to lead to the river-side. 
 The interior has been modernised in parts, but there are many 
 fine panelled rooms and much old furniture. The family 
 portraits include a beautiful picture of Sir Job Charlton, 
 which has recently been copied for the House of Commons, 
 by J. Bridge, of Shrewsbury, and some fine examples of 
 Vandyke, Sir P. Lely, and Reynolds. There is a curious 
 and finely preserved portrait of Richard III., and some 
 very fine Rembrandts and other old masters. 
 
 Looking from the east end of the church, the visitor will 
 see below him a scene of unusual beauty. On his left a 
 yew-tree of great size, and partly hidden by its branches 
 the ancient almshouse of St. Giles, referred to on the tomb 
 of William Foxe, its long roof picturesquely broken by three 
 stone gables in front (the centre one containing an empty
 
 LUDLOW TOWN AND NEIGHBOURHOOD. 
 
 PORCH AND ORATORY, LUDFORD HOUSE. 
 
 niche), and has many quaintly designed chimneys in the 
 rear. Beyond it is a fine old timber and plaster house, 
 formerly the Bell Inn, when the main road passed round that 
 way. Two or three thatched cottages, and the ancient garden 
 wall of Ludford House, half-smothered in climbing plants and 
 wild pink, bound the view on the right, and Titterstone hill 
 towering over the house-tops completes the scene. 
 
 The inscription on the Foxe brass given above shows 
 that there was an almshouse here at an early period, as it
 
 LUDFORD. 71 
 
 had fallen into decay in the first part of the sixteenth 
 century, and was re-edified by Foxe about that time. His 
 building seems also to have come to grief, for the almshouse 
 was re-founded by Sir Job Charlton in 1672, when the 
 present building was erected. The inmates were known as 
 the Warden and poor of the Hospital of Ludford, had 
 power to purchase and hold land, to sue and be sued, and 
 had a common seal. The latest use of the seal occurs on a 
 lease in 1718. 
 
 THE OLD BELL INN, LUDFORD.
 
 72 LUDLOW TOWN AND NEIGHBOURHOOD. 
 
 WHITCLIFF. 
 
 From Dinham on the north-west, to Ludford on the 
 south side oi the town, the river Teme, reinforced by the 
 Corve, runs under a high bank of limestone, which, with 
 great rocky walls in some places, steep slopes of bracken- 
 fern in others, now interrupted with crags and ragged 
 brushwood, and now channelled with smooth valleys of 
 green turf, supports a large space of open green-sward and 
 
 THE TEME UNDER WHITCLIFF. 
 
 shady grove. This space, backed by woods and fenced by 
 belts of fir-trees, has been for ages the public recreation 
 ground of the people of Ludlow ever since, in fact, it was 
 given them (together with a great deal more, since sold) by 
 Jourdan de Ludford, in the thirteenth century. From it 
 not only the town and castle, but very beautiful views of 
 great extent and variety are visible. Stretton Hills, Corve 
 Dale, and Wenlock Edge are seen over the interrupted 
 reaches of the Teme to the north. Eastward the grey wall 
 of Titterstone is an effective background to the towers of 
 the castle and church, and the various ranges of goodly 
 mansions and irregularly built houses below them ; while, 
 down the river, Caynham Camp stands forth from the 
 surrounding woods, a dark mass against distant streaks of 
 grey receding ranges. Opposite the castle the trenches 
 can still be seen which were thrown up in the Parliamentary
 
 LUDFORD. 
 
 73 
 
 siege. From the Ludford end of the common a rocky path 
 leads down to the water's edge ; and a fine reach of river, 
 calm and quiet between foaming weirs, lies beside it as it 
 continues to Dinham Bridge. Here other paths converge 
 from the higher parts of the common, coming down the 
 steep little valleys on the hillside, which are rather curiously 
 named, as Thankful Gutter, Hornbeam Gutter, &c., the 
 latter from the trees (Hop Hornbeams) which line it ; 
 Gutter being the local name for a small valley. 
 
 THE BULL INN YARD, LUDLOW.
 
 i! 
 
 NORMAN FONT, HOLGATE. 
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 SURROUNDING DISTRICT. 
 
 As a centre for rural drives and rambles, this district is 
 hardly to be surpassed. Without the wild and gloomy 
 grandeur of Wales and Cumberland, it has enough of hilly 
 and rugged character to redeem it from the too luxuriant 
 tameness of purely lowland scenery, and can even claim a 
 very considerable mountain, as all who climb Titterstone 
 will testify. Indeed, one of its greatest charms is the 
 continual variety of its scenery. Not only in verdant 
 meadows, rich with weed and flower, and by the side of still 
 pools or quiet reaches of stream, not only through waving 
 corn and deep grass, can the explorer rove ; but in the 
 gloom of thick woods, and between high over-hanging 
 crags, under which the water rushes and raves among the 
 stones, and on the breezy height of wild, wind-beaten heath 
 and common, or knee-deep in bracken and gorse on the 
 steep volcanic sides of Titterstone itself, boulder-strewn 
 and crowned with crags. 
 
 Then what district can compare with the Welsh Border 
 for picturesque buildings ? From the peasant's cottage, 
 whose grey and mossy thatch overhangs the patched and
 
 SURROUNDING DISTRICT. 75 
 
 weather-stained walls, the huge oven and bulging chimney 
 suggestive of the warm ingle-nook within ; to the many- 
 gabled homestead, of more important proportions and 
 greater elaboration of wall and chimney, carved barge- 
 board and moulded beam ; or to the grey walls and high- 
 peaked roofs of the old Abbey Farm, where the fat monastic 
 glebe is still richer than its neighbours, with its ricks stand- 
 ing among ruined walls and arches, and its sheltered 
 orchards, where the gnarled and mossy fruit trees yet 
 yield abundant harvests to generations their planters 
 little dreamed of. 
 
 Not less are the " stately homes of England " repre- 
 sented here, both modern mansions, standing out from 
 park and lawn, and antique manor-houses, more in harmony 
 with the glorious surroundings, their groups of chimneys 
 and high parapets rising among trees more ancient than 
 themselves. From still older dwellings the stateliness has 
 departed, and naked and grim are the walls of many a 
 baronial fortress in this once turbulent land. 
 
 Nor should the traveller despise the lowly village church, 
 for if he care ever so little for antiquity, there is still a field 
 teeming with interest in the ancient parish churches of a 
 district like this, despite the devastations of time and the 
 havoc of so-called restorations " a name " (to quote the 
 Rev. W. J. Loftie) "that covers more sins than charity 
 itself." 
 
 To see a piece of country thoroughly, there is nothing like 
 walking, but this being out of the question for the longer 
 distances, I purpose to show how they can be explored most 
 readily in a series of drives and short railway excursions.
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 WALK TO RICHARD'S CASTLE. 
 
 Huck's Barn Overton Sunny Gutter Moor Park Haye 
 Woods Batchcott The Castle Mound and Ruins Clark's 
 Account Church Boney Well Court House and Dove- 
 cot. 
 
 In starting to walk southwards, it is very desirable to note 
 that the road which crosses Ludford Bridge, and now makes 
 a straight course, cut through the rock, towards Ashford, 
 has not been corrected in the present Ordnance Map, 
 though it was changed more than twenty years ago. If we 
 pass through a gate just beyond the first cottage, which is 
 the only one in sight, a footpath leads through fields at the 
 back of Huck's Barn (an ancient farmhouse modernised, 
 from which there are magnificent views of the country 
 towards the Clee Hills), and keeps for some distance the 
 course of the former main road. About half a mile from 
 Huck's Barn it passes through a corner of the grounds of 
 Overton Lodge (Roland G. Venables, Esq.) where magnifi- 
 cent trees abound, and the large white house is seen through 
 them to the right and down a rocky lane to the left, past 
 Overton Cottage (Alfred Salwey, Esq.,) into the main road 
 again. The walk so far has been through scenery of con- 
 siderable beauty, though of the ordinary pastoral character, 
 but the high fence of Overton Cottage is no sooner passed 
 than a change is manifest. We are then at the mouth of the 
 ravine celebrated by its connection with Comus, and 
 known locally as Sunny Gutter. The road is without fence 
 on that side, and the woods, breast high in fern and bramble, 
 come right down to the wheel-tracks, and hang over the 
 road to join the grand old beeches of Moor Park on the 
 opposite side, which overshadow a pretty little modern 
 Queen Anne lodge. The woods on the upper side of the 
 road extend for a very great distance, and are inhabited 
 by numbers of deer, which roam about in a wild state. 
 A good pedestrian would find it a great treat to walk from 
 here to Mary Knowl, and so down the Wigmore road to 
 Ludlow. The scenery thus explored is of the most romantic 
 and delightful kind, but it is a fatiguing piece of work, and
 
 WALK TO RICHARD'S CASTLE. 77 
 
 the path not always easy to trace. It may be much 
 shortened by taking a path on the right some half mile up, 
 which, entering a lane, passes into the footpath near Huck's 
 Barn. But instead of going through the gate into the lane, 
 the path may be followed where it winds again to the left, 
 and zigzags through the woods for about a mile and a half, 
 rejoining the road above Whitcliff by a path called Morti- 
 mer's Walk. 
 
 Continuing the walk to Richard's Castle, we climb the 
 steep pitch between the park palings on one side and the 
 unfenced woods and thickets on the other, noticing, some 
 half mile up, a narrow cart-track into the woods, worn 
 into deep ruts by the timber wains, which, unlikely as it 
 seems, leads to a large house (Hay Park), grandly situated 
 in a large deer park on the upper slopes of the Vinnall. 
 By the roadside is a weird and lonely pool, whose waters 
 of inky blackness have gained it the name of the "Black 
 Pool." Of course it is haunted ; and there are people who 
 will describe the ghostly visits of one of the Salweys, who 
 lived many years ago at the neighbouring Moor Park, 
 which has now passed out of the family, though they still 
 own large estates here, and have done so since the fifteenth 
 century. The pool once passed, the woods give place to 
 fields and lanes, and the park has a stone wall instead of 
 the grey deer-fence overhung with dense foliage. The 
 road now descends a steepish bank, but if we get over a 
 stile on the left, we can cut off a corner, and enjoy a grand 
 view over the park towards the Clee hills, the chief point 
 in which is the Hall, standing in a fine situation among 
 huge masses of trees. A few years ago it was an old 
 mansion, and was then altered and enlarged by the late 
 Major Foster, whose widow generally resides there. As we 
 follow the field-path, a quaint white house on the knoll in 
 front is the residence of the Ven. Archdeacon Maddison, 
 rector of Richard's Castle. It appears to be all of the last 
 century, with some older out-buildings, but its strong 
 position, and the remains of a moat on one side, suggest a 
 greater antiquity. This, with a few houses by the wayside, 
 is the hamlet of Batchcott, placed at the foot of another of 
 the lateral gorges of the Vinnall, which again affords a 
 stroll of the rarest beauty and almost endless variety ; 
 Hanway Common forming one side, and the Haye Woods 
 and a smaller common the other bank.
 
 78 LUDLOW TOWN AND NEIGHBOURHOOD. 
 
 U 
 
 RICHARD'S CASTLE CHURCH. 
 
 RICHARD'S CASTLE. 
 
 Opposite the old smithy, two lanes diverge to the north- 
 west. The nearer one leads between high banks, notable 
 in spring for flowers, for nearly a mile to the church. 
 Occasional peeps on the right give the valley and woods 
 below Haye Park, and on the left a more extensive and 
 distant view, bounded only by the blue horizon. In this 
 and the neighbouring lanes are numbers of fine yew-trees, 
 which attain great size in the limestone which here abounds, 
 though there is but one in the churchyard, and that of 
 moderate growth. 
 
 The lane, though ascending always, has not prepared us 
 in the least for the grand and elevated site on which we 
 find the church, and some old houses near it, to be situated ; 
 for, standing in the churchyard, the height is such that 
 Leominster Priory, Orleton spire, and even the Malvern 
 Hills, can readily be seen to the south and eastward. 
 
 This place takes its name from Richard Scrob, or Fitz- 
 Scrob, a Norman at the court of Edward the Confessor, 
 whose presence was the cause of Earl Godwin's rebellion. 
 Of his castle (of which very little remains, and that nearly 
 hidden in trees and rank undergrowth, at the west end of 
 the churchyard) our greatest authority, Mr. Clark, says :
 
 WALK TO RICHARD'S CASTLE. 79 
 
 " Richard's Castle is distinguished by one of those remark- 
 able works in earth which have hitherto in topographical 
 books passed undescribed. It is one of a series of works 
 common on the Welsh Border and the Middle Marches. 
 Such were Hereford, Worcester, Wigmore, and Caerleon. . . 
 
 " What invader originally threw up the magnificent 
 earthwork which must have guided Fitz Scrob in his choice 
 of a residence is not known, but from its summit is com- 
 prehended one of the noblest and most extensive prospects 
 to be found even in a quarter of England, very rich in 
 pleasing combinations of wood and water, lofty hills, and 
 broad fertile dales. As the new settler traversed the meads 
 of the Severn, and left behind him the grassy meadows of 
 the Teme and the Lugg, and rode up the rising ground to 
 the point where his own or his son's devotion afterwards 
 established a church, he must have blessed the fate which 
 placed him in a country so rich, and in the possession of 
 which the vast earthwork immediately before him would 
 be an assurance of more than ordinary security. 
 
 " What were the precise works constructed by Richard 
 it is difficult to say ; that he converted the mound into a 
 keep, and girt the annexed ward with a wall, is possible, 
 though the masonry, of which vast fragments remain, is 
 apparently of rather later date. 
 
 "The castle of Richard's Castle occupies a position equally 
 remarkable for beauty and for strength. It stands upon 
 the eastern slope of the Vinnall Hill, an elevated ridge 
 which extends hither from Ludlow, and a little to the west 
 of the castle is cleft by two deep parallel gorges, beyond 
 which the high ground recedes in two diverging ridges, of 
 which one extends westward in the direction of Wigmore, 
 and the other southerly to the river Lugg at Mortimer's 
 Cross, having on the ridge the ancient British earthwork of 
 Croft Ambrey, and below it the fortress of Croft Castle, 
 reported to occupy an early English site. 
 
 " The castle, though far below the summit of the Vinnall, 
 stands upon very high ground, sloping rapidly towards the 
 east. An exceedingly deep and wide gorge descending 
 from the west bounds the position on the south, while a 
 smaller and tributary valley descending from the north falls 
 into the greater valley below the castle, and thus completes 
 its strength on the south, west, and north points. The 
 defence towards the east is entirely artificial. Upon the
 
 8o 
 
 LUDLOW TOWN AND NEIGHBOURHOOD. 
 
 point of the high land above the meeting of the two valleys 
 a large and lofty mound has been piled up, the base of 
 which is about 300 feet above the valley, and the summit 
 sixty feet higher." Leland says : " The keep, walls and 
 towers of it stand, but going to ruin. There is a poor house 
 of timber in the castle garth for a farmer. It belongeth 
 
 PORCH, RICHARD S CASTLE CHURCH. 
 
 now to the King, of late to Lord Vaux, after to Pope. 
 There is a park impaled." 
 
 The Church of St. Bartholomew is large and most inter- 
 esting, having nave, south aisle, transept, porch, and 
 chancel, all ancient and beautiful. There is on thejfnorth 
 side of the nave a small blocked-up Norman window, which 
 is the earliest feature, though the wall is probably Norman 
 too, and there are some half-buried apertures, which seem 
 to indicate the existence of a crypt under the chancel, 
 which, if there, is also probably Norman. The only Early 
 English work is the priest's door and one of the above 
 apertures, which appears to be the head of a door, the rest 
 of the building being fourteenth century. To the early 
 part of this period belongs the aisle, with its fine east 
 window covered with ball-flowers, which also appear on the 
 capitals of the nave arcade. This aisle and the transept 
 have their roofs and gables of the original pitch, and are 
 both very picturesque.
 
 WALK TO RICHARD'S CASTLE. 81 
 
 The transept, which is called St. John's aisle, contains 
 some very beautiful fourteenth century glass in the upper 
 lights, and a broken canopy in the wall with ornament of 
 the same date. In front of it is a late seventeenth century 
 canopied pew of good design, and the whole church is pewed 
 with oak, in which are many fragments of carving. Near 
 the font (modern) is an immense coffin-lid of the thirteenth 
 century, with an unusually bold and well-preserved foliated 
 cross sculptured on it. 
 
 The tower is separated from the rest of the church, and 
 stands at the eastern edge of the hill, a few paces from the 
 chancel. It had a wooden spire, which was burnt, and is 
 now covered with a pyramidal slate roof. There are 
 several small loop-holes and three belfry windows with 
 plain tracery. The nearness of the castle makes it appear 
 unlikely to have been detached for defensive purposes, and 
 no doubt the bells would be better heard in the village 
 below than if it stood in the more usual position. At 
 Berkeley, Gloucestershire, the tower is detached from the 
 church so that it should not be used in attacks on the 
 castle. 
 
 The communion plate is old, and was given by different 
 members of the Salwey family. It is of silver, and consists 
 
 THE COURT HOUSE AND DOVE-COTE, RICHARD'S CASTLE.
 
 82 LUDLOW TOWN AND NEIGHBOURHOOD. 
 
 of three patens (two of them are large, and have the 
 Salwey arms and this inscription, " In usum Ecclesiae de 
 Castro Richardi ex dono Johis Salwey, Arm. Rector is 
 A.D. 1713), a small one uninscribed, a chalice and a 
 flagon, having each the Salwey arms and the inscription, 
 " Ex dono Richard Salwey Arm ; in usum Paroch de 
 Castro Richardi in com Herefordice, 1729." 
 
 In the bottom of the gorge below the castle is the cele- 
 brated Boney Well, a copious spring, in which in spring 
 and autumn small bones are found. This phenomenon has 
 been remarked for ages, and was noticed by Camden. On 
 the slope here a body of Royalists, under Sir Thomas 
 Sunderford, 2,000 strong, were defeated by Colonel Birch. 
 A town is said to have stood here which held a charter for 
 a fair from King John. All the houses near the church are 
 more or less ancient, but they were more beautiful till a few 
 years ago, when sweeping changes were made, which, with 
 an epidemic of iron roofs which broke out recently, have 
 made sad havoc with this parish. Descending, however, 
 the precipitous lane which goes due east to the village, we 
 pass some very good ones. One, near the bottom, has an 
 immense pigeon-house with a very fine gabled roof. This 
 is the Court House ; it has also a rich piece of half-timber 
 work, some fine panelled rooms, and a large portion of the 
 moat remaining. In a field nearly opposite is a very 
 perfect and extremely curious moated area. A few more 
 twists in the lane bring us to Richard's Castle village, 
 where there are two inns, one ancient, and from which 
 we can return along the Leominster Road, past a new 
 school-house to Batchcott, whence the same route is 
 retraced to Ludlow.
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 
 WALK TO BROMFIELD, THROUGH OAKLY PARK. 
 
 Views of Castle Prior's Halton Oakly Park Bromfield 
 Bridge Priory Village Burway. 
 
 Starting through Dinham and crossing the New Bridge, 
 we take the lane to the right, and if we still keep to the 
 right, where it divides at the quarry, we get fine views of the 
 castle, which on this side stands on the edge of the rock. 
 A mile or more of pleasant lane, bounded by hedgerows, 
 over which we get peeps of Bringewood on one side and the 
 two Clees on the other, brings us to Prior's Halton, a small 
 cluster of old houses, one of them displaying unusual timber- 
 work in its gable end, and, just beyond, to the lodge-gate of 
 
 f--^-~ - . 
 
 DRUID OAKS, OAKLV PARK.
 
 84 LUDLOW TOWN AND NEIGHBOURHOOD. 
 
 Oakly Park. Shortly after entering, the road descends a 
 wooded slope, on which is a large oak, which, being uprooted 
 by the wind some years since, was turned completely over, 
 and stands on its head with roots in the air. As we proceed 
 through the park the scenery is varied and beautiful ; on 
 the left the park trees stretch away for miles to join the 
 woods on Bringewood Chase ; to the right we get glimpses 
 through venerable oaks of the red brick walls and gardens of 
 the Hall. The latter, the residence of Lady Mary Windsor 
 Clive, is a Georgian building without much beauty or interest 
 that is not derived from its charming situation on the ridge 
 overlooking the Teme Valley, and commanding distant 
 views of Ludlow. Shortly after passing it, we emerge 
 through the side wicket in the lodge-gate into the road near 
 the Teme Bridge at Bromfield. From the upper side of the 
 bridge is a charming view of still and peaceful landscape ; 
 the river, fringed with alders and dammed up by the mill- 
 weir below, flows almost without visible current between 
 the park and open meadows. Below bridge, the scene is 
 more lively ; the still pool at our feet divides to supply 
 mills on either side, and beyond the foaming weir, the river, 
 winding through a wooded glade, is lost among the trees. 
 To the left the mossy wheel of the old saw-mill, overhung 
 with great trees, beyond it a timber-yard and cultivated 
 ground, and, showing pale against the dark firs, the grey 
 old Priory Church, with its ivy-mantled ruin. Passing 
 over the bridge, in the lane beyond, made more gloomy 
 by the shadow of tall Scotch firs, is the massive gate- 
 house of the Priory. Let us pass into the churchyard, 
 which was also the burial-ground of the monks, and 
 recall what is known of its history. No chartulary 
 remains, but that a monastery existed on this spot from 
 a remote period, before Ludlow itself was founded, 
 is certain, and that it was of considerable importance in 
 Saxon times is shown by the entry in Domesday Book r 
 under the head " Quod tenet Ecclesia Sanctae Mariae. The 
 same church holds Brunfelde, and there it is built. It is 
 worth 505. annually to the canons, and Nigel, the physician, 
 has i6s. annually from this manor. There were in King 
 Edward's time twenty hides, and twelve canons of the same 
 church had the whole." Then follows an interesting 
 passage in the history of the Priory : " One of them (the 
 canons), Spirtes by name, had alone ten hides, but when he
 
 WALK TO BROMFIELD, THROUGH OAKLY PARK. 85 
 
 was banished from England King Edward gave these ten 
 hides to Robert Fitz Wimarch, as to a canon ; but Robert 
 gave the land to a certain son-in-law of his, which thing 
 when the other canons had shown the king, forthwith he 
 ordered that the land should revert to the church, only 
 delaying till at the time of the then approaching Christmas 
 he should be able to order Robert to provide other land 
 for his son-in-law. But the king himself died during those 
 very festal days, and from that time till now the church 
 
 BROMFIELD PRIORY FROM THE RIVER. 
 
 hath lost the land. This land Robert now holds under 
 Earl Roger ; it is waste, and was found waste." 
 
 This Nigel was physician to Roger, Earl of Montgomery, 
 and Spirtes is known to have lived in the reigns of the 
 Danish kings Harold Harefoot and Hardicanute, and to 
 have been banished by Edward the Confessor. Robert 
 Fitz Wimarch, to whom was given the land of the banished 
 Spirtes, is believed to have been Robert the Deacon, or 
 a Norman ecclesiastic, whose daughter was married to
 
 86 LUDLOW TOWN AND NEIGHBOURHOOD. 
 
 Richard Scrob,* who would in that case be the son-in-law 
 mentioned as receiving the land. In the reign of Henry I. 
 the establishment was a College of Secular Canons, but that 
 it soon after became a regular priory is shown by the 
 mention of Osbert, Prior of Bromfield, as witness to a deed 
 in 1148. It was greatly enriched by Henry II., in whose 
 reign (1155) the canons subjected themselves to the Bene- 
 dictine monastery of Llantony Secunda, near Gloucester, 
 and so continued till the dissolution. The habit of Bene- 
 dictine monks seems to have varied more than that of other 
 orders, but was generally a white tunic with a black scapular 
 over it, and a large oval hood. In the 2oth of Edward I., 
 the prior claimed free warren in the manor, by charter of 
 Henry II., which comprised a grant of Infangthef ; and 
 one Henry de la Chapelle, being guilty of theft, was tried 
 and hanged by the prior. Pope Nicholas' Taxation in 1291 
 gives 23 6s. 8d. as the annual value ; at the dissolution 
 it was 78 igs. 4d. In the fourth of Philip and Mary, the 
 manor was granted to Charles Foxe, whose estate, including 
 Oakly Park, passed by marriage to Matthew Herbert, 
 whose descendant, the Earl of Powis, devised it to Henry 
 Clive, in whose family it still continues. 
 
 Looking round the churchyard, we see that the situation 
 of the monastery was delightful. Occupying a long pen : n- 
 sula, nearly isolated by the confluence of the Onny and the 
 Teme, its position must have been strong as well as secluded, 
 especially when the triangle was completed by a high wall, 
 in which stood the present Gate-house. The refectory 
 would be parallel to the church ; the farm, domestic offices, 
 and mill, would occupy the slope, with cloisters between the 
 south side of the church and the Teme, and between the west 
 end and the Gate-house, the principal courtyard. The 
 church remains nearly entire, and is from this side a fine 
 object, with its tower of three stages in the earliest phase of 
 Early English, and the high-pitched gable of the nave with 
 good Decorated window. 
 
 If we enter through the fine arch in the north wall of the 
 tower, the lower story of which forms a porch, before us is 
 the corresponding arch, with nook shafts and rich mould- 
 ings, which admits to the nave. The first object of interest 
 is the font, which is a plain example of the same early period 
 as the greater part of the church. On the south is the coat 
 * Richard the Scrob gave the name to Richard's Castle.
 
 WALK TO BROMFIELD, THROUGH OAKLY PARK. 87 
 
 PRIORY GATE-HOUSE, BROMFIELD. 
 
 of arms of the second Charles, painted upon the wall, 
 which was probably rebuilt when the buildings on that side 
 were converted into a residence for the Foxe family. The 
 north aisle is separated from the nave by an arcade of two 
 fine Early English arches, supported on a massive round 
 column with plain capital, and two of the aisle windows 
 are lancets of the same period. The present nave and 
 chancel are only the nave of the Priory church, and are 
 continuous, but were formerly divided by a screen of 
 carved wood-work of the Elizabethan character, in a line 
 with the east end of the aisle ; it has been taken down and 
 placed against the east wall as wainscoting. The pulpit is 
 composed of well-carved oak of the same period, but put 
 together in recent times. In the south wall is a small 
 doorway, which, if we pass through, admits us into the ruin 
 on that side the church. This ruin does not exhibit any 
 features which would identify it as part of the monastery. 
 The doors and windows are all post-Reformation, or, if the 
 walls are part of the Priory, which is likely enough, have 
 been inserted. A careful examination of the external walls 
 of the church from this side, which is not accessible from 
 the churchyard, but forms part of the grounds of Oakly 
 Park, reveals facts not before obvious. In the east wall 
 can be traced the old Norman chancel arch, now built up,
 
 88 LUDLOW TOWN AND NEIGHBOURHOOD. 
 
 and a Perpendicular window inserted, showing that the 
 chancel of the Priory church was destroyed when the latter 
 was converted into use for the parish ; and going round to 
 the north side, a good Norman arch of several orders in the 
 wall of the nave, showing the . existence of a chapel or 
 continuation of the aisle. As the east walls of the nave and 
 aisle have good Perpendicular windows, they were proba- 
 bly brought from the destroyed portions, and not designed 
 at the time of the alteration. A plain trefoil-headed 
 piscina of large size was also brought from the old chancel, 
 and re-fixed in the built-up chancel arch instead -of the 
 south wall, as customary. This shows the alteration to 
 have been made in Catholic times. With the exception of 
 a corbel table with a number of grotesque heads, under the 
 eaves of the aisle, the above Norman arches are the only 
 remains of the monastery of Henry I's time, and of 
 the Saxon one which preceded it there are no traces. Most 
 of what remains must have been built at the time when the 
 monastery flourished under the patronage of Henry II., 
 of which period the belfry windows, two pointed lights 
 recessed under a pointed arch, are an example. There are 
 no monuments of any age, but in the south wall is a fine 
 arched recess, with rich mouldings and cusps, which was no 
 doubt intended for the tomb of a prior or benefactor. 
 Under it has been cut the Foxe arms, with the letters 
 C. F. & E. F. 
 
 The Gate-house is a building of two stories, the lower of 
 solid Early English masonry, with a wide and heavy arch 
 through the centre, flanked by massive buttresses, and the 
 upper of timber, now restored and used as a school-room. 
 Except two small loop-holes, the windows have been 
 modernised. 
 
 The village is scattered along the main road to Shrews- 
 bury and its adjacent lanes. Where it crosses the Onny on 
 a bridge of three arches is a row of Lombardy poplars of 
 gigantic growth. They are known far and near as the 
 Twelve Apostles, though now reduced to eight by the 
 terrific gales of recent years. Bromfield contains a number 
 of picturesque thatched cottages, and is altogether a very 
 charming place, chiefly on account of its wealth of timber 
 and the lively and varied character of its two rivers. One 
 can return to Ludlow by rail by taking the road which turns 
 east from the Onny bridge, past a very quaint thatched
 
 WALK TO BROMFIELD, THROUGH OAKLY PARK. 89 
 
 cottage, where the key of the church is kept ; it is not 
 much more than half a mile to the station. One can also 
 return to Ludlow by the main road (three miles), which is 
 comparatively uninteresting, or by a footpath between it 
 and the river, which is gained by a field-gate some hundred 
 yards along the main road, and is moderately easy to find. 
 About half-way through the fields is Burway (C. W. 
 Wicksted, Esq.,) an old farm-house, beautifully situated 
 among fine trees on the river bank. It is said, with some 
 probability, to have been the Home Farm of the castle. 
 A carving over the porch, representing a portcullis (the 
 badge of the House of Tudor) under an arch with grotesque 
 figures, seems to confirm this, but the building is now under- 
 going extensive alterations. The path in another field 
 or two passes into a lane, which joins the road near the 
 Corve Bridge at Ludlow. 
 
 GATEWAY, BROMFIELD PRIORY, FROM THE ROAD.
 
 CHAPTER X. 
 
 WALK TO ORLETON, THROUGH ASHFORD, 
 WOOFFERTON, ETC. 
 
 Overton Lodge Ashford Hall Mill Ashford Carbonell Ash- 
 ford Bowdler Woofferton Comberton Orleton Court 
 Church. 
 
 Leaving the town by Ludford Bridge, past the old manor 
 house of Ludford, and following the Leominster road, 
 which is here cut deeply into the limestone, we arrive in a 
 short mile at Overton turnpike, where the road divides, 
 and keep straight ahead for Ashford, past Overton Lodge 
 (Richard Betton, Esq.) Another mile of level turn-pike 
 road, through pretty cultivated country, with some fine 
 peeps out to the left towards Caynham Camp, Tinker's 
 Hill, and Titterstone, lies before us. Ashford Hall, on the 
 right before we reach the village, a Georgian brick mansion, 
 has some fine timber in the grounds (Capt. Joynson). 
 Turning to the left, the Teme is passed on a modern bridge 
 of a single span, and just below it is Ashford Mill, where 
 there was a mill at the time of the Domesday Survey. 
 This one, though not very old, is pretty from below, looking 
 up stream. Passing along the lane parallel to the river, on 
 a high bank to the left the little church of Ashford Carbonell 
 lifts its quaint bell-cot above a dense mass of black yew- 
 trees. It is an old building, showing Norman workmanship 
 in both nave and chancel. The nave has a south porch and 
 dormer in the roof, and is lighted by a single long lancet at 
 the west end and a two-light fourteenth century window in 
 each side. There are two Norman doors, one with the 
 nail-head moulding and a low Norman chancel arch. 
 The chancel has five windows, three fifteenth century and 
 square-headed, one of which is in the east wall, and two 
 small Norman ones on the north. In it are a few late 
 mural monuments. During a recent restoration, on the 
 removal of the plaster from the east wall, it was found 
 that the fifteenth century window mentioned above had 
 replaced a curious group of openings of Norman date, viz., a 
 vesica over two small, round-headed lights, an arrangement 
 of extreme rarity. The latter window has been removed to
 
 WALK THROUGH ASHFORD, WOOFFERTON, ETC. 91 
 
 VESICA WINDOW AND NORMAN LIGHTS, ASHFORD CARBONELL CHURCH. 
 
 the south side, and the Norman ones opened and restored.* 
 Returning over the bridge into the Leominster road, 
 Ashford Bowdler is a picturesque village to the left. It has 
 two or three narrow lanes of cottages widely separated by 
 gardens and orchards, and a small church buried in trees 
 at the back of the Vicarage. It is an unpromising little 
 structure on the edge of the river, which here divides the 
 two Ashfords, but, on close examination, there are several 
 small Norman windows and a built-up Norman door, which 
 indicate an un-looked for antiquity. There is nothing 
 very striking between this place and Woofferton, which 
 is a group of half-timber farms, made important of late 
 years by the addition of a large inn (the Salwey Arms) and 
 a station, it being at the junction of the Shrewsbury 
 
 * A drawing of this east end was sent by the Vicar to the late 
 J. H. Parker, C.B., who in his reply said : " the very remarkable 
 east end of your church I believe to be quite unique ; at least, I have 
 never seen one like it. It is difficult to tell the exact date of it. 
 The two lower windows by themselves would be of the eleventh 
 century, but it is hardly probable the vesica can be so early." 
 The restoration also included a quantity of new stained glass and 
 costly oak fittings, the rebuilding of the bell-cot, the removal 
 of the dormer, and re-mounting of the old font.
 
 92 LUDLOW TOWN AND NEIGHBOURHOOD. 
 
 and Hereford Railway and the Tenbury line. There 
 are several places worth seeing near here, such as 
 Brimneld, Richard's Castle, &c., but in a walking excursion 
 Orleton is about a convenient distance. To reach it, turn 
 to the right past the station, along the road which crosses 
 the railway. For more than a mile there is not a house in 
 sight ; if any exist, they are hidden among the trees. Then 
 a pretty cottage or two, and the entrance to Comberton 
 village, which, with the pool and half-timber farms, is a 
 capital subject for a sketch. Indeed, the whole village is 
 very picturesque. About half-way up the road a narrow 
 lane turns southwards between two farmhouses. This is 
 the nearest way to Orleton ; in fact, the shingle spire of the 
 church is visible at once. This village is a good specimen 
 of those for which Herefordshire is so famous, and its 
 orchards, cottages, and farms could not easily be matched 
 in any district. Orleton Court is a very large and interest- 
 ing house of timber and plaster. In the panelling of one of 
 the rooms, said to have been occupied by Charles I., is an 
 old inscription, " Honner Him in Hart that souffered on 
 
 CHURCHYARD CROSS, AT ORLETON.
 
 WALK THROUGH ASHFORD, WOOFFERTON, ETC. 93 
 
 the Crosse for Thee, and worship Him." During alterations 
 a cannon-ball was discovered lodged in the wall. The 
 church is very interesting, and the north side very pic- 
 turesque. The base of the tower, west door therein, and 
 
 , x v v 
 
 PULPIT AND CHANCEL ARCH, ORLETON.
 
 94 
 
 LUDLOW TOWN AND NEIGHBOURHOOD. 
 
 priests' door in chancel are Norman, remainder of the 
 chancel Early English, with six good lancets, and niche for 
 figure in east wall. The font has nine large figures under 
 Norman arches. Note the fine old chest hewn out of a 
 solid trunk, also the heads of King Edward and Queen 
 Eleanor to right and left of chancel arch. There are 
 remains of good stained glass coeval with the tracery in the 
 Geometrical Decorated windows on the north of the nave. 
 There is a very fine Elizabethan carved pulpit, and on the 
 north side of church an ancient timber porch nearly buried 
 in ivy, and on the south a churchyard cross, with part of the 
 head gone, but unusually well preserved. In the east face 
 of the base of this cross, and of others in the neighbourhood, 
 is a small pointed niche in which it is supposed the Paschal 
 light was burned at Easter. 
 
 For those whose powers of endurance are great enough, 
 there is a delightful walk from here through the village of 
 Richard's Castle to Ludlow, but those who have well 
 explored the route described above will probably prefer to 
 retrace it as far as Woofferton Station, and take the train 
 back. 
 
 '^NB*av>.y 
 
 COTTAGE AT LEINTHALL STARKES.
 
 CHAPTER XL 
 
 WALK TO STEVENTON. 
 The River-side Fold Gate Steven ton. 
 
 From Ludford Bridge the road turns down stream at the 
 Ludlow side, past the bottom of Old Street. Just beyond 
 the second flour-mill it passes so near the river, that long 
 reaches of " watery glade " are visible over the bushes 
 which fringe the bank, and if we get over the stile, where 
 the road turns to the left, these charming views are still 
 with us. In a few hundred yards the fishing-path leaves 
 the river side, and turns up the bank to the road, which now 
 continues along a ridge at some height from the river. 
 On the left, a few yards over the railway bridge, Fold Gate 
 is a small but well-preserved seventeenth century house of 
 brick. Rather more than half a mile ahead is Steventon 
 a few old cottages standing at 1he corner of a lane, down 
 which, if we turn to the right, a fine old stone house becomes 
 visible through the trees on the river-side. Many of its 
 windows have been tampered with, but altogether a very 
 good Jacobean house remains. It has the moulded brick 
 chimneys characteristic of that style, a fine old porch and 
 doorway, and a quantity of old panelling within. The 
 whole is now in an extremely picturesque condition, but a 
 general renovation is impending, which will probably 
 destroy some of it. The garden is raised high above the 
 river by a heavy stone wall, and on the south side the moat, 
 still filled with water, remains. 
 
 The title of Manor-house is sometimes given to the old 
 cottage just above, a name which would seem to be more 
 appropriately applied to the large house above described ; 
 but this cottage is said to be so called in old deeds, and it 
 certainly has the appearance of having been part of a larger 
 building, and contains a huge chimney, heavy beams, and 
 carved panelling. 
 
 The walk may be pleasantly continued by passing under 
 the railway, and up the lane which presently crosses 
 Tinker's Hill, through a deep depression which occurs about 
 midway in its length. Descending through woods and
 
 9 6 
 
 LUDLOW TOWN AND NEIGHBOURHOOD. 
 
 coppices, in another mile it joins the turnpike road at a 
 picturesque house, formerly an inn called " The Serpent," 
 possibly in allusion to some old legend of a local serpent or 
 dragon. By turning to the left here we can return to 
 Ludlow by Caynham Camp, or through Ashford by turning 
 to the right. 
 
 OLD FIRE-PLACE, STEVENTON.
 
 CHAPTER XII. 
 
 DRIVE THROUGH WIGMORE, LEINTWARDINE, 
 DOWNTON, ETC. 
 
 Whitcliff Woods Mary Knowl Comus Valley (Sunny Gutter) 
 Pipe Aston Elton Leinthall Starkes Wigmore 
 Church Castle The Mortimers Abbey Leintwardine 
 Downton-on-the-Rock Limestone Gorge Down ton 
 Castle Clungunford. 
 
 LEAVING Lndlow by the Broad Gate, and turning to the 
 right, immediately after crossing Ludford Bridge, the road 
 ascends between rocky banks to the undulating sward on 
 Whitcliff, from which we get a most complete and striking 
 view of the town and surrounding landscape. At the point 
 where the road turns into the wood a pause should be 
 made to enjoy the glimpse of castle towers and walls now 
 visible above the solid masses of middle-distant foliage. 
 After a two-mile tug up an ever ascending road, unfenced 
 for the most part from the green vistas and leafy glades of 
 the vast woods through which it lies, open fields appear, 
 and the woods, getting thinner, recede, and show the 
 buildings of Mary Knowl Farm, a little beyond which the 
 summit of the hili is reached. 
 
 Here all depends on the weather ; if the air is clear, 
 range after range of hills are visible, and in two directions 
 the views are grand. Below the road is the deep ravine, 
 called Sunny Gutter (the scene of the romantic incident 
 which suggested to Milton his masque of Comus), along 
 the northern slope of which the road descends, till a narrow 
 pass in the hills admits us into the flat plain of Wigmore. 
 At the foot of the hill is the diminutive church of Pipe 
 Aston, which is worth inspection. Its best feature is a 
 Norman north door with richly carved tympanum ; in its 
 centre is a lamb holding a cross, within a circle supported 
 by an eagle and a winged ox : the symbols of St. John and 
 St. Luke. There are one or two Norman windows, a good 
 roof, and small bell-gable. Again following the road, we 
 arrive, in another half-mile of undulating country, at Elton, 
 where there is a Queen Anne mansion (Salwey family), 
 and the church near it. The latter has been restored, but
 
 LUDLOW TOWN AND NEIGHBOURHOOD. 
 
 NORMAN TYMPANUM, PIPE ASTON. 
 
 retains its Perpendicular rood-screen of carved oak, and 
 some seventeenth century gravestones. 
 
 Here we are at the edge of a level tract of country com- 
 pletely hemmed in by hills, and variously known as 
 Wigmore Lake and Wigmore Hole, probably a real lake 
 at some remote period, before the Teme forced a channel 
 for itself through the limestone rock at its north-east 
 corner. Still keeping the main road, we shortly descry 
 the clump of old yews which marks the little church of 
 Leinthall Starkes from the neighbouring fields and hedge- 
 rows. Although a Norman fabric, the church itself is not 
 very picturesque, but the yew-trees are magnificent. It 
 has a double bell-gable and Norman font. A little farther 
 is the village a long street of straggling gable-ends and 
 fruit-tree hidden roofs. For nearly a mile its quaint 
 cottages line the road, thereby earning for it the title of 
 " Long " Leinthall. 
 
 WIGMORE. 
 
 By this time we see, across the misty hollow, with its 
 willowy hedgerows and level fields, a pile of wooded hills ; 
 and in front of them a smaller detached hill, crowned with 
 large trees and fragments of ragged masonry, and on a 
 ridge still lower, a dark and sturdy tower, ivy-clad, and 
 capped with timber bell-cot ; and straggling over the ridge, 
 and perched on its orchard-covered slopes, are stone and 
 thatch and tile-roofed cottages and farms. It is Wigmore ;
 
 WlGMORE. 
 
 99 
 
 and the ruin-covered hill was the palace and stronghold of 
 the Mortimers, the sturdy old church was the resting-place 
 of the Shobdon Canons, and the wooded hills beyond, the 
 hiding-place and sanctuary of the Lollard John Oldcastle, 
 Lord Cobham. Another mile, and we have entered the 
 village street, where over the green and weedy roofs the 
 church rises grey among the yew-trees. 
 
 Here are two good inns, where we may put up our 
 horses and refresh. From the open space in the centre of 
 the village, where stood, some years since, the ancient 
 market-house, a steep and narrow lane leads to the east 
 end of the church a large and very interesting building. 
 It has nave, south aisle, north chapel, chancel, and tower, 
 all on different levels to suit the rocky situation, all pic- 
 turesque, and all, at first sight, Decorated, but on entering 
 the south door, through its beautiful timber porch, we see 
 at once that the original church was Norman, and had no 
 aisles, for in the piece of nave wall which remains on the 
 south is a well-preserved Norman window, and the column 
 and two arches are Early Decorated, like the aisles. The 
 piscina and sedilia are placed in the sill of one of the chancel 
 windows, and high up in the south wall is a small piscina, 
 extremely interesting as indicating the presence of an altar 
 in the rood-loft. The chapel is a Late Perpendicular lean- 
 
 WIGMORE FROM THE PARK.
 
 ioo LUDLOW TOWN AND NEIGHBOURHOOD. 
 
 to on the north, and has been double its present size, as we 
 see by one of the arches communicating with the nave 
 being blocked up, and by the piscina still showing in the 
 outside wall. Two chantries are mentioned by Browne 
 Willis ; the other was no doubt at the east end of the aisle. 
 Note the fine Perpendicular roof to the nave, and the 
 herring-bone masonry in the north wall. Owing, doubt- 
 less, to the proximity of the abbey, the church is entirely 
 devoid of monumental interest. From the churchyard 
 there is a delightful view, and at its west end a lane leads 
 past some old thatched cottages to the castle, whose 
 massive ruins present but a shadow of its former grandeur, 
 though much that is interesting remains. Its double moat 
 is still to be seen, and beyond it the massive outer walls, in 
 which the gate-house and entrance arch, nearly buried in 
 ivy, are conspicuous. To the left the ruins contain a few 
 windows temp. Edward I., and on the right is a round 
 tower projecting into the ditch. Above these we see the 
 ruins of the keep on a high central mound, and beyond the 
 hilly country which formed the castle park. From the 
 ruins an extensive view is obtained of the surrounding 
 varied landscape, with Wigmore Church and village a fine 
 object in the middle distance ; beyond, the amphitheatre 
 of hills towards Leominster ; to the left, the cultivated 
 plain shut in by Gatley Hill, Croft Ambrey, the Vinnalls, 
 and Bringewood range. 
 
 THE MORTIMER FAMILY. 
 
 Wigmore is first mentioned by the Saxon Chronicle, 
 which states that in A.D. 921 " King Edward in the 
 Rogation Days commanded the burgh at Wisingamere to- 
 be built." The same authority says that the Danes with a 
 great army besieged it, but were repulsed in the same year. 
 It is named in Domesday, Ralph de Mortimer then holding, 
 it. It is commonly stated that he received it as a reward 
 for turning out Edric, Earl of Shrewsbury, but though 
 Ralph did put down Edric, there is no evidence that the 
 latter ever held the castle. 
 
 It remained, with vast estates, for several centuries in the 
 Mortimer family, " whose ambition and intrigues made 
 more than one English monarch uneasy on his throne." In 
 the Barons' War, Roger, sixth Lord of Wigmore, took part
 
 WIGMORE ABBEY. 101 
 
 with Henry III., and by stratagem delivered his son, 
 Prince Edward, from Hereford Castle and brought him to 
 Wigmore. In 1327 another Roger Mortimer received 
 Queen Isabella and her son, King Edward III., at Wigmore, 
 where they were welcomed with magnificent festivities, 
 " so likewise in his forests and his parks, and also with 
 great costs in tilts and other pastimes." This Roger, being 
 blinded by pride, set no bounds to his ambition and osten- 
 tation ; his own son called him the " King of Folly." He 
 was at last surprised with the Queen in Nottingham Castle, 
 and seized by the young king, then eighteen, whose 
 authority he had usurped. He was hanged in Smithfield, "the 
 body remaining on the gibbet," says Stow, " two days and 
 nights to be seen of the people." In 1354 his grandson, 
 also named Roger, obtained a reversal of the attainder, and 
 it was declared in Parliament that the charges on which he 
 had been condemned were false and the sentence unjust. 
 This Roger distinguished himself in command of the 
 English forces in Burgundy, where he died, leaving a son 
 Edmund, who married Lady Philippa Plantagenet, 
 daughter of Lionel, Duke of Clarence, which union gave to 
 his decendants their title to the English crown, afterwards 
 the cause of so much bloodshed. In 1424 the male line of 
 the Mortimers became extinct, and Wigmore passed to 
 Richard Plantagenet, Duke of York, who was beheaded 
 after the battle of Wakefield. Edward IV. resided here 
 when Duke of York. In the war between King and Parlia- 
 ment the castle was burnt, and has gradually lapsed into 
 ruin. 
 
 WIGMORE ABBEY. 
 
 Having thoroughly examined the castle, church, and 
 village, we take the road leading northwards, from which 
 we see, across the wide prospect ahead, the roof and build- 
 ings of the abbey farm ; to our left is the Castle Hill, and, 
 looking back, the old church shows grandly above the 
 orchards. Keeping the main road for a mile, we turn down 
 a lane to the right, and stop before an ordinary farm-gate. 
 On either side of it are stone buildings with no great air of 
 antiquity, but on entering we see that they have had 
 ancient doors and windows, and formed part of the outer 
 court of the abbey. To the right and left are sheds, and 
 facing us is the gate-house to the second court, a stone
 
 102 
 
 LUDLOW TOWN AND NEIGHBOURHOOD. 
 
 GATEHOUSE TO WIGMORE ABBEY. 
 
 and timber building of singular design and extremely pic- 
 turesque. Beyond it is the abbey barn and pigeon-house ; 
 in a line with it to the left the guest-house and foundations 
 of the church. This is all that can be identified of the 
 Augustinian monastery of St. James and St. Victor which 
 flourished here, but even this is of considerable interest, 
 and much more might be brought to light by excavation. 
 The gate-house is a long building of two stories, the lower 
 half of stone, with a stone arch through the middle reaching 
 into the upper story, which is of timber, and projects on 
 heavy oak brackets which rest on a beam supported on 
 stone corbels. It is now used as stabling, and a doorway 
 has been cut in the outer wall. The guest-house is a stone 
 building with original roof, but the addition of an attic 
 floor has destroyed its character. It retains a tall fourteenth 
 century window on the west and a large Perpendicular one 
 in the east, the recess of which is covered with stone panel- 
 ling of similar design to the tracery. The lower story has 
 some small chambers, now full of farm implements. Un- 
 fortunately the Tudor farmhouse was burnt a few years ago,
 
 WIGMORE ABBEY. 103 
 
 and the chimneys only escaped. To the north of the house 
 are some ivy-covered masses of masonry, which, with the 
 foundations which can be traced under the turf, are aU 
 that remain of the church, though there are numerous 
 sculptured fragments lying about and built into the walls 
 which exhibit rich Norman and Early English workman- 
 ship. The barn is a very large structure, and well worth 
 examining, if it should happen not to be full of straw. It 
 was probably erected very early in the history of the abbey, 
 and is built of timber with low side walls and extremely 
 high and steep roof, supported on seven principals starting 
 from the ground and constructed of timbers of the most 
 gigantic size. Another relic is the sewer of the abbey, 
 running under the farmyard, a huge passage arched with 
 stone, and believed by the natives to reach as far as the 
 castle ! The pigeon-house was a most important feature 
 of monastic life, and probably this one is coeval with the 
 monastery, though the weather-vane has a later date. 
 
 Nearly all that is known of the abbey's history is con- 
 tained in a manuscript, written by a canon of Wigmore in 
 the thirteenth century, the text of which is preserved in 
 Dugdale's Monasticon. In the account of the ruin at 
 Shobdon on page 114 will be found a brief summary of the 
 earlier portion, which refers to the building of the monastery 
 there, by Oliver de Merlimond. The manuscript goes on 
 to tell how they removed to a place on the Lugg, near 
 Aymestrey, and were forced to leave by Sir Hugh de 
 Mortimer and settle at Wigmore. " It was too narrow and 
 rough to make a habitation for them," and " there was too 
 great deficiency, especially of water, and the ascent to the 
 church was very disagreeable to them, and how they went 
 about the country on every side to seek and consider of a 
 place where they could make a decent and large dwelling 
 for themselves and others for ever." How Walter Agay- 
 neth discovered " the place where the abbey now stands," 
 and how they were granted the ground by Sir Hugh, 
 removed thither their goods, and built themselves habita- 
 tions of wood. " And not long after came Sir Hugh to 
 visit the canons, and there, by the request of Brian de 
 Brampton, he sent for a monk of Worcester, who, when he 
 had marked out the site of the church, caused the founda- 
 tions to be dug." Sir Hugh laid the first stone, Brian de 
 Brampton the second, and his son John the third, and all
 
 104 LUDLOW TOWN AND NEIGHBOURHOOD. 
 
 three became benefactors to the abbey, Sir Hugh com- 
 pleting the church at his own expense. 
 
 The other documents which throw light on its history 
 relate chiefly to the steps taken at its dissolution, and it 
 seems certain that the main buildings were destroyed 
 immediately after. In 1574 a Dr. Dee, the celebrated 
 dabbler in witchcraft, writing to Lord Burghley, mentions 
 having seen while at Wigmore Castle " an heap of old 
 papers and parchments, obligations, acquittances, accounts, 
 &c., in time past belonging to the Abbey of Wigmor, and 
 there to lye rotting, spoyled, and tossed, in an old decayed 
 chappell not committed to any man's speciall charge, but 
 three quarters of them as I understand to have byn taken 
 away by diverse (eyther taylors or others) in tymes past." 
 The manor seems to have passed into the possession of the 
 Cockeram family, and then to the Salweys, whose des- 
 cendant, Mr. Alfred Salwey, still holds it. 
 
 The men who established the abbey, and passed their 
 lives in this secluded spot, were canons regular of the order 
 of St. Augustine, called Black Canons from their habit, a 
 black cassock with a white rochet over it, and a black 
 cloak and hood over that. Though bound by the rules of 
 their order, they were not monks, and not necessarily even 
 priests, their rule being less strict than the monks', and they 
 wore beards, while the monks were always shaved. They 
 were great builders, and in those early times Art, Agri- 
 culture, and Medicine owed much to their diligent study. 
 
 LEINTWARDINE. 
 
 Resuming our drive along the lane, we presently pass 
 the water-mill which the canons wandered so far to ob- 
 tain, a pretty old building, and parts of it perhaps original. 
 Further on at the cross roads is a quaint old farm called 
 Paytoe, with some relics of the abbey built into its walls. 
 Here, by turning to the left, we may prolong our drive to 
 Leintwardine, which is a good place for a halt, or, keeping 
 straight on, and crossing the Teme at Criftonford Bridge, 
 return through the gorge at Downton, which route is 
 described on next page. Choosing Leintwardine now, we 
 keep the narrow lane to the north, till at the end of a couple 
 of miles, turning suddenly into the main road, we get the 
 first glimpse of the village, which is strikingly pretty. The
 
 DOWNTON-ON-THE-ROCK. I(>5 
 
 Teme, after receiving the Clun, flows across flat meadows 
 in the foreground, and is spanned by a picturesque bridge 
 of several arches ; beyond it the village shows through 
 large trees, and the tall square tower of the church above 
 them. 
 
 If we have not already refreshed at Wigmore, there are 
 two suitable inns here, one of which, the Swan, is an old 
 house with some fine carving and panelling. " Lanterden," 
 as it is pronounced here, has a large church, with tall tower, 
 having a quaint staircase turret, at the end of the south 
 aisle ; large nave, clerestory, chancel, and chapel. There 
 is a good Norman door and other ancient features, and 
 some interesting tombs, but within much is new. This 
 village is a favourite headquarters for anglers, the streams 
 being preserved by a local association, and abounding in 
 trout and grayling. A little to the west is Coxall Knowl, 
 claimed by local savants as the site of the last battle fought 
 by Caractacus against the Roman invader. 
 
 DOWNTON. 
 
 Ludlow is about seven miles from here, and the return 
 journey may be taken by the main road by Mocktree Hill, 
 whence is a charming view of Leintwardine, but the 
 Downton route next described is far the most interesting. 
 At the bottom of the village a narrow road starts nearly 
 east, afterwards following the slope of Totter idge Hill, and 
 from it we get for nearly two miles delightful views of the 
 serpentine course of the river, which winds and twists in 
 the vale below. In two sharp turns to the left we enter 
 the narrow valley of Downton, at the mouth of which we 
 get a glimpse of Burrington, a pretty, but not an interesting 
 village, the church and many of the houses having been 
 entirely rebuilt. Here we regain the road which we left 
 near the abbey. The limestone gorge is only beginning to 
 reveal itself when the lane bends between high banks, from 
 which we emerge at the diminutive village of Downton-on- 
 the-Rock, where are some good old houses, and a church 
 now disused, a new one having been built by Mr. Knight, 
 about a mile away. The old one, though dilapidated, is 
 very interesting, having a small timber porch, good four- 
 teenth century windows, curious Norman oak font, and two 
 Norman doors. There is also a good Early Norman chancel
 
 106 LUDLOW TOWN AND NEIGHBOURHOOD. 
 
 arch, in the thickness of which is a staircase to the rood- 
 loft, which remains (a most unusual thing), but the rich 
 carving of the screen under it is sadly mutilated. The west 
 wall contains no opening, and the solitary Early English 
 loop in the east has been built up, and on the wall inside 
 are two elaborate seventeenth century mural monuments. 
 On one of them (to George Haughton) is the following 
 epitaph, to which the present state of the building gives 
 additional pathos : 
 
 " What here you see is but a due respect 
 To him who never did this place neglect ; 
 'Twas here he did adore ye highest Lord, 
 Who to his soul rich comfort did afford ; 
 'Twas here he did, with great joy and content, 
 Receive his holy word and sacrament. 
 Since, then, he loved this sacred place so well, 
 'Tis very meet y l here his name should dwell." 
 
 Here we leave the carriage, which will go on by the road 
 and wait on the other side of Downton Castle, while we go 
 back down the lane to a point where there is a gate into the 
 wood, and follow the cart-track, which descends steeply to 
 a picturesque stone bridge with a wooden parapet. The 
 water is deep and calm between rocky banks, of a peculiar 
 green colour, and so clear that the trout can be seen dis- 
 porting themselves in its transparent depths. Crossing the 
 bridge, the path turns to the left along the river-side. On 
 the opposite bank is a pretty cottage, half hidden in the 
 rank vegetation, with its strip of garden-ground hardly 
 distinguishable from the wooded bank which rises behind. 
 
 As we proceed, the open glade, through which the river 
 sweeps with foaming current, soon narrows to a wild and 
 rock-bound cleft, where the trees, springing from crevice 
 and fissure, wreathe themselves into fantastic sprays and 
 masses, among which the sky is only seen at intervals. 
 Fairly within the gorge the bank on this side recedes, and 
 the trees are of large size, but on the opposite side the pale 
 limestone rocks rise vertically from the water. Farther 
 down there is a place where the timber has been felled, and 
 there is an open space among the beeches, whose com- 
 panions lie prone amid the flowers and brambles. The 
 river is still now, and glides beneath the boughs almost 
 noiselessly ; but through the leaves comes the distant 
 murmur of a weir, as yet invisible faint at first, but grow- 
 ing louder at each step, till a turn in the path shows an old
 
 THE TEME AT HAY MILL. 
 
 107 
 
 THE TEME AT DOWNTON. 
 
 building through the stems, and below it the roofs of a 
 larger one nes tling under the bank, and then, as we descend 
 into the level sward between the woods and the river, the 
 loud roar of the pent-up stream bursts upon the ear. Our 
 first impulse is to make for the narrow footbridge which 
 spans the stre am close to the house, and, on gaining it, the 
 scene which meets our eyes is one which, far or near, it 
 would be difficult to match for wild, secluded beauty. 
 On the left the Hay Mill, in the deep shade of overhanging 
 trees, its mossy wheel half hidden by the grass-grown 
 masonry which divides it from the r iver-bed and the pent- 
 house roof overhanging it. Above the weir the trees 
 stretch their branches so far as to completely choke the 
 chasm with foliage. On the opposite side the grey lime- 
 stone stands up from the water in a perpendicular cliff, to
 
 io8 LUDLOW TOWN AND NEIGHBOURHOOD. 
 
 which the hazel and bramble cling in ragged luxuriance. 
 For a long distance the woods approach the stream, often 
 hanging over it, and the path continuing generally beside 
 its edge, but sometimes mounting a slight eminence, gives 
 great variety, and affords occasional peeps of fine reaches of 
 river. In one place the rock closes in upon the water, so 
 that a passage has had to be hewn through it, and the path 
 winds for a time through a romantic cavern. Not far from 
 here a rather good saw mill is passed on the other side the 
 stream, and soon after the Castle Bridge, a stone structure 
 of three arches, from which a pretty road winds up to the 
 Castle. The latter was erected about the middle of last 
 century by Richard Payne Knight, who paid great attention 
 to domestic architecture and to landscape gardening of the 
 wilder and more picturesque school, and to whose refined 
 taste, and that of his family, is owing the preservation of the 
 park and river scenery in all its natural beauty.* Ascend- 
 ing the slope, we see the castle is a very state!}' but incon- 
 gruous edifice, placed in a most charming situation, and 
 commanding views of extreme and varied loveliness. 
 After passing along the sunk fence into the road, we find 
 the vehicle awaiting us, and, turning to the east, very soon 
 enter the main road, and following it for nearly two miles 
 through some good scenery, of which Bringewood is the 
 chief feature, enter the village of Bromfield, which, with the 
 return route, will be found on page 83. 
 
 CLUNGUNFORD, ETC. 
 
 If the traveller prefers to continue north of Leintwardine, 
 an interesting piece of country may be seen, returning 
 through Stokesay, but this district is easily explored by 
 rail via Craven Arms. Broadward Hall is a curious stone 
 building near the Clun, and close at hand is Heath House, 
 an old red-brick mansion of the seventeenth century, with 
 an extraordinary staircase of oak, hung with ancient 
 tapestry. On the same estate, a little to the west, is Hop- 
 ton Castle, a small but nearly perfect Norman keep. There 
 is another fine castle at Brampton Brian, a mile or two 
 west of Leintwardine , which withstood a famous siege in 
 
 * This walk through the Downton Woods is, by permission of 
 A. J. R. Boughton Knight, Esq., open to the public on Tuesdays 
 and Fridays.
 
 CLUNGUNFORD. 109 
 
 the Parliamentary wars, and whose ruins are still large and 
 of great interest. 
 
 A mile and a half to the north-west of Hopton Heath 
 station, Beckjay Mill, on the Clun, is very picturesque, and 
 was a favourite subject with David Cox. Clungunford 
 House stands in a park just above (J. C. L. Rocke, Esq.,) and 
 is modern. The " Rocke Arms " in the village is a good 
 little inn, and the place generally pretty and interesting. 
 Just above the inn is a large half-timber farmhouse, with 
 some fine groups of perforated chimneys, called Abcott 
 Manor-house. It has some panelled rooms and ornamental 
 ceilings within, and was long the residence of the Princes, 
 to whom there are monuments in the church. The latter 
 stands just across the river, and is well worth visiting. 
 Chiefly thirteenth and fourteenth century, it has some very 
 good windows, of the latter period. One of them in the 
 north-west angle of the chancel is an interesting instance 
 of the low side or leper's window, as to the use of which so 
 many theories are held. Externally it is not now very 
 different from the others, except in reaching lower down the 
 wall. Within, it has arrangements for a seat, and hinges 
 as if for a wooden shutter. On the north side is a lean-to 
 chantry of similar date. It communicates with the chancel 
 by two arches, one large and the other smaller. In the 
 wall under the east wall is an aumbry or locker. Two of 
 the bells are mediaeval, having inscriptions and the stamp 
 known as Royal Heads assigned to Edward I. and Queen 
 Eleanor. A little north of the church is a tumulus, in 
 which were found, some years since, a number of bronze 
 spears and other implements of an unusual character. 
 
 There is a picturesque village at Broome, one and a half 
 miles north of Clungunford, and a station on the Central 
 Wales Railway, from which Craven Arms is about three 
 miles. The station is called Broome and Aston, from 
 Aston-on-Clun, in the parish of Hopesay, a mile or so due 
 north. The church at Hopesay is ancient and interesting, 
 and so is Sibdon Castle, in spite of the peculiar Georgian 
 patchwork on the principal face.
 
 CHAPTER XIII. 
 
 DRIVE THROUGH WIGMORE TO AYMESTREY, 
 KINGSLAND, ETC. 
 
 Wigmore Hall Deerf old Forest Leinthall Earles Croft 
 Ambrey Gatley Park Aymestrey Mortimer's Cross 
 Shobdon Court Priory Village Kingsland Eyton 
 Yarpole Lucton Croft Castle Church Bircher. 
 
 THIS drive, as far as Wigmore, is described at page 98. 
 If from that point, instead of turning north, we follow the 
 principal street past the Castle Inn, and under the fine 
 elms which line the park of Wigmore Hall (Major General 
 Franklin), we shall presently emerge in front of the latter 
 building, which is very agreeably situated on the slope, 
 with woods behind, and can be recognised as an old half- 
 timber house, in spite of more modern plasterings and 
 additions. After passing two or three quaint cottages, we 
 are in the open country, with the Wigmore hills receding 
 behind, and those of Aymestrey and Croft rising in front. 
 To our right is Deerfold Forest, a tract of primeval wood, 
 interesting as the refuge of the Lollards in the time of 
 Henry V., and as containing a specimen of that botanical 
 rarity so venerated by the Druids the mistletoe oak. 
 
 LEINTHALL EARLES AND CROFT AMBREY. 
 
 A narrow lane to the left is the main approach to Leinthall 
 Earles or Little Leinthall, a small village at the bottom of 
 the valley, between Gatley Hill and Croft Ambrey. Its 
 numerous thatched cottages and barns are dotted among 
 the orchards, in true Herefordshire fashion, and its quaint 
 little church, though plain, is not uninteresting. The bell- 
 cat is placed a little east of the gable, and is octagonal in 
 shape, but covered with a conical roof. The west wall is 
 stone to the level of the eaves, and timber and plaster in 
 squares above ; against it is an open timber porch (a most 
 unusual position), and over it a window. The south wall 
 is supported by two huge buttresses, and contains a Norman 
 loop or two. From this village the camp on Croft Ambrey 
 may conveniently be visited. The lane starts due south,
 
 CROFT AMBREY. in 
 
 leaving the village where there is an old-fashioned stone 
 farmhouse at one corner, and a cottage with carved timbers 
 a little on its left ; and goes straight up the hill-side, be- 
 coming in the upper part more like the stony bed of a stream. 
 At about a third of the ascent it ceases, and the steep 
 bracken-covered common is almost trackless. A little 
 higher is a well which supplies water to Gatley Park, an 
 old-red-brick house, Jacobean or later, which stands part 
 way up the opposite hill, nearly hidden by trees. It has a 
 good group of red-tiled gables, with a mass of chimneys in 
 the centre, and large ivy-covered porch ; and is approached 
 from the village by a long winding ascent through chestnut 
 trees. A stiff climb from the spring brings us to the first 
 entrenchment, within which rises a second, and the oval 
 space on the summit is reached. The site is now covered 
 with trees, more or less thickly, but the entrenchments are 
 of great size, and can be made out easily. There are only 
 two on the steep side by which we have ascended, but on the 
 south, where the slope is more gentle, there are as many as 
 four, all well defined. Croft Ambrey is one of the chain of 
 British Camps which reaches from the Malvern range to 
 Coxall Knowl, and is said to have been so named from 
 Ambrosius. There is from it a most magnificent view, 
 extending, it is said, into thirteen counties. From the 
 Black Mountains in Breconshire to the Malverns and the 
 Clee ; from the high summits of Montgomeryshire round to 
 the Longmynd and Caer Caradoc range, the eye follows 
 with delight the swelling hills and vast undulating plain, 
 till they die away at the edges into the horizon. Down the 
 northern slope of the camp the romantic and beautiful 
 demesne of Croft Castle, richly clothed with ancient timber, 
 stretches away towards the distant flats where the blue 
 smoke of Leominster and its Priory tower are faintly seen. 
 
 AYMESTREY. 
 
 But at present we have to continue our drive from 
 Wigmore towards Aymestrey. Nearly a mile beyond the 
 turning for Leinthall the road passes under an avenue of 
 fine elms, reaching a mile or more to the grounds of Yatton 
 Court and the entrance to Aymestrey village. Here the 
 Lugg is crossed by a bridge of three arches, and the river is 
 open to the road, making with the old houses on the other
 
 112 LUDLOW TOWN AND NEIGHBOURHOOD. 
 
 side a pretty scene. Here is a good inn, and the houses are 
 scattered for some distance along the village street, which 
 is only moderately picturesque, except where at the far end 
 the church shows its battlemented tower above the fence. 
 The latter is a pleasing object (though in a very low situa- 
 tion), and very interesting. Most of the nave, tower, 
 clerestory, and chancel are fifteenth century work, but the 
 interior is chiefly Decorated. There are four pillars on 
 each side, of very unusual design, a group of small shafts 
 half-detached from a larger one, and supporting three 
 pointed arches. There is a very handsome chancel screen 
 of the fifteenth century carved oak, carried partly on 
 corbels and partly on wooden uprights and similar screen- 
 work is continued round the east ends of the two aisles so 
 as to form chapels. In the chancel are some good Jacobean 
 tombs, and a carved oak pulpit of the same date. It was 
 not unusual on the Welsh border to build the church so as 
 to be available for defence in case of emergency. Aymes- 
 trey is an interesting example of this. The doors are very 
 strong, and fastened by an arrangement rarely met with, 
 except in mediaeval castles. A square beam of wood is 
 drawn from a hole in the masonry of the jamb, to a corres- 
 ponding hole on the opposite side. The base of the tower, 
 which is also the porch, is vaulted, and has a circular open- 
 ing through the stonework for hoisting bells, so that the 
 defenders could not be burnt out, and could take pot shots 
 at any assailants who might be attacking the door. The 
 room above has narrow windows, very much splayed in- 
 ternally, and with window-seats on each side, forming a 
 kind of guard-room. A very curious early fourteenth 
 century clock from this church is preserved in the South 
 Kensington Museum.* 
 
 SHOBDON. 
 
 At the next turn seyeral roads meet at a spot which has 
 given the name to a world-renowned and sanguinary 
 battle Mortimer's Cross. Such a place was a favourite 
 spot in early times for erecting a wayside cross, and perhaps 
 one of the Mortimers had done so at the cross roads nearer 
 to Leominster, where the pillar now stands to commemorate 
 the great struggle between Yorkists and Lancastrians ^ 
 * Since the above notes were taken, the church has been restored.
 
 SHOBDON PRIORY. 113 
 
 There is here a large inn, a water-mill on the River Lugg, 
 and an old bridge of three arches over it ; but our way lies 
 in the other direction, along the narrower road to the right, 
 and in a short distance along a still narrower one, also to the 
 right, which being rather elevated gives a good view over 
 the flat country round Leominster. In less than a mile 
 this lane brings us to a lodge gate in a fringe of trees, after 
 passing through which we descend a long slope in the Park 
 towards Shobdon Court, a brick and stone building in the 
 Louis Quatorze style (the seat of Lord Bateman), standing 
 among cedars of extraordinary size. Close to it is the 
 church, the tower old and ivy-covered, and in the graveyard 
 a Norman font, with good sculpture ; but the body of the 
 church was rebuilt in the " Gothic style " in 1752, and is 
 very ugly. To the north-west of the church, on a grassy 
 eminence, are the remains of the one which was pulled 
 down, or, more accurately, of Shobdon Priory, which were 
 re-erected here by the late Lord Bateman. There are five 
 arches, one large and central, and two smaller on each side ; 
 which, though now placed in a group, must have been 
 brought from different parts of the original building. 
 They are perhaps the finest examples of late Norman work 
 that exist. The large arch has a number of nook-shafts, 
 which are covered, as well as the capitals, with the most 
 elaborate sculpture. Besides many of the richer mouldings 
 met with in Norman work, figures, dragons, and intricate 
 interlacing foliage are lavished on the surface decoration 
 with the richest effect. The two nearest the centre form an 
 obtuse angle with it, and have solid tympana carved with 
 large figures ; that on the north representing the Deity 
 within an aureole, and that on the south the entry of our 
 Saviour into Jerusalem. The outermost arches are similarly 
 treated to the central one. It will be seen what a unique 
 example it presents of Norman work, by the fact of it having 
 been selected by the founder of the Architectural Depart- 
 ment in the Crystal Palace to represent the later Norman 
 period in the fine series of architectural examples there. 
 It is a matter for congratulation that so perfect a cast is 
 preserved, not only for the sake of students, but on account 
 of the corroding action of the weather on the original work. 
 Mr. Parker, the great archaeological authority, says in his 
 Manual of Gothic, after speaking of certain of the above 
 details : " Shobdon Church is altogether one of the richest 
 examples of Norman sculpture in existence." 
 
 H
 
 ii4 LUDLOW TOWN AND NEIGHBOURHOOD. 
 
 The only recorded history of Shobdon Priory is included 
 in that account of Wigmore Abbey written in Norman- 
 French by one of the canons in the thirteenth century, and 
 copied in the Monasticon. The opening passages are 
 much too long for quotation here, but they are devoted to 
 an account of " the very noble bachelor, worthy, valiant, 
 and bold Monsieur Hugh de Mortimer," who lived in the 
 reign of King Stephen and his steward, Oliver de Merlimond. 
 " At that time there was in Shobdon no church, but only 
 a chapel of St. Juliana, and that was of wood, and sub- 
 jected to the church of Aymestrey." Then follows an 
 account of the building and dedication of the new church, 
 which from internal evidence was in 1141, and the instal- 
 lation therein of two monks from the Abbey of St. Victor 
 at Paris. " He gave them in like manner his farm at 
 Ledecote, with granges full of wheat, and oxen, and sheep, 
 and pigs in great plenty, and two carucs of land." Bishop 
 Robert de Beton (1131 to 1148) at this time having quar- 
 relled with the Earl of Hereford and excommunicated him 
 and the whole city, came to Shobdon at Oliver's request, 
 and lived among the canons. On his departure, the canons, 
 finding it very lonely, requested their Abbot to replace 
 them with others knowing the English language, and re- 
 turned to Paris. Their successors, however, had many 
 quarrels with Sir Hugh, and also returned to their abbey, 
 and when he had finally made peace with them and con- 
 firmed their various grants, they discovered " that the 
 place was very far from water, of which they were much in 
 want, and determined to remove thence to Aymestrey, in a 
 place they call Eye, close to the River Lugg, and there 
 laid the foundation of the church, as people who proposed 
 to fix there a lasting habitation. But it happened other- 
 wise, for there arose at that time a very great war between 
 Sir Hugh de Mortimer and Sir Joce de Dinan, then lord of 
 Ludlow, and Sir Hugh was surprised and held prisoner in 
 Ludlow Castle until ransomed. About this time the canons 
 were desirous of having an abbot over them, and one An- 
 drew, from the same abbey of St. Victor, was sent over and 
 consecrated abbot by the bishop. Soon after, the friends 
 of Sir Hugh observed the church which the canons had 
 erected at Aymestrey, and advised him not to suffer that 
 work to be finished there at the entrance to his land, lest his 
 enemies might come and have there a lodging-place and
 
 KINGSLAND CHURCH. 115 
 
 stronghold in despite of him, for he had on all sides many 
 enemies ; and he acted after their counsel, and made the 
 canons remove to the town of Wigmore," where their 
 buildings would be under the eye of his own garrison. The 
 rest of their wandering and the foundation of the abbey is 
 given in the account of Wigmore. 
 
 Lost in bewilderment as to what could have induced any 
 one to turn such marvellous work out of doors, in order to 
 set up such a meagre and tasteless absurdity as the present 
 church, we return down the hill, and, leaving the church 
 and Court on the left, descend a narrow road past the 
 stables, enter the village street, and turn to the left along 
 half its straggling length of thatched roof and gable end, 
 not so picturesque, but perhaps more flourishing than some 
 we have passed. We turn to the right soon after leaving 
 it, and again to the right, into a bare and uninteresting lane, 
 which very soon touches the railway at a level crossing, and 
 enters the outskirts of the considerable village of Kingsland. 
 
 KINGSLAND. 
 
 In that part of it which lines the main road are two 
 good but small inns, some fine old houses, and a very 
 singular tree a Scotch fir with an immensely tall and 
 smooth stem, on the extreme end of which is a bunch of 
 foliage. It is very rare to find an entire church of the 
 Middle-Pointed or Decorated period, but St. Michael's, 
 Kingsland, which lies among fields to the south of the 
 main street, has only one or two features which are not in 
 the finest phase of that style, viz., an Early English lancet on 
 the south of the chancel, a fine fifteenth century wooden 
 porch, and an addition of the same period on the top of the 
 tower. Clerestory, aisles, tower, and chancel all afford 
 beautiful and curious examples of Middle-Pointed detail, 
 the only drawback being the ugly slate roofs. On the north 
 side is a very curious little chantry chapel, on the east of 
 the porch and opening out of it. In it is a large stone 
 coffin under a richly cusped mural arch. It is lighted by 
 an east window, filled with very intricate and unusual 
 tracery, some side openings of different shapes, which 
 appear never to have been glazed, and a window under the 
 mural arch, having a number of straight, narrow apertures 
 into the church. The clerestory has circular windows.
 
 n6 LUDLOW TOWN AND NEIGHBOURHOOD. 
 
 each with varied tracery, an arrangement very rarely found 
 except in this county, where there are one or two other 
 instances. A well-preserved sanctus bell turret stands on 
 the east nave gable, and altogether this is a most remark- 
 able and beautiful building, and well worth careful study. 
 This place is also the farthest point we can extend the 
 drive to, consistent with leisurely sight-seeing both ways ; 
 we may, therefore, make a longer stay, and seek refresh- 
 ment for man and beast. Two inns, the Bell and the 
 Corners, stand at the junction of a smaller road with the 
 main village street, and along this road, facing north-east, 
 we start for the return journey, making straight for the 
 River Lugg, and, in crossing it, leave the flat country 
 finally for the hills and dales by which Ludlow is environed. 
 Just across the bridge, a lane goes due east for two miles 
 through some very broken and untouched country to 
 Eyton. The farms and houses of this parish are many of 
 them very rustic and beautiful, but it lies too wide of the 
 route to be undertaken now. Its little church has been 
 restored some years since, but contains, among other 
 ancient remains, a fine rood-screen of the fifteenth century 
 and a good timber porch of slightly later date. 
 
 YARPOLE. 
 
 On leaving the Lugg bridge, the lane winds among 
 wooded hills to the top of a bank at a place called Basket's 
 Gate, where is a cottage so quaint in outline as to be worth 
 remembering. Descending as quickly into a crooked, shut- 
 in little valley, the view of woody hills and green hollows is 
 soon lost, but presently regained with the addition on one of 
 the nearer ridges of a curious stumpy spire. Ruddy orchards 
 are round us as we enter the old-world village of Yarpole, 
 of which the chief thoroughfare is enlivened by a small, 
 clear stream. Down a side lane to the left, our attention 
 is at once drawn by the large yew-trees of the churchyard, 
 and a singular detached belfry. The church itself has been 
 almost rebuilt, and is a neat edifice, containing little of 
 interest besides a font with shallow Norman arcading. 
 But the detached belfry, which stands some yards to the 
 north-west, is very delightful. It has a lower story of 
 heavy masonry, with narrow loopholes ; the upper part, of 
 wood, with the bells, is supported on a framing of large
 
 YARPOLE AND BIRCHER. 117 
 
 beams planted in the ground independent of the walls. 
 Under the eaves of the upper part are a number of quatre- 
 foil openings on each side. These detached towers are 
 believed to have been so placed for purposes of defence a 
 theory supported by their loopholed walls and the absence 
 of windows in the lower stories, also by their being most 
 frequent on the Welsh Border. At the corner of the village 
 street is a small, ancient building of stone, the original 
 purpose of which it is difficult to determine. Local tradi- 
 tion states it to have been a temporary resting-place for 
 bodies on the way to the churchyard. It has a round 
 archway in both side walls, and was more probably a gate- 
 house to a small monastery. Yarpole possesses a mill 
 more efficient than picturesque, and a great many delight- 
 ful old houses. Turning north-east from the centre of the 
 village, we join the highway at four cross-roads, with 
 Bircher village to the left. Bircher Know], a clump of 
 timber on a considerable mound, is passed at the point 
 where we enter the main road from Leominster to Ludlow. 
 Beyond here the road is bare and open, but commands 
 views of considerable variety and beauty to the east and 
 north. Just off the road to the right is the large and pic- 
 turesque village of Orleton, for account of which see page 92. 
 It will repay exploring, if time will allow, and the next lane 
 will take us to it. It was the birthplace, in the thirteenth 
 century, of the great Adam de Orleton, who was so promin- 
 ent in political affairs at the beginning of the fourteenth. 
 He was Bishop of Hereford in 1317, of Worcester in 1330, 
 and died Bishop of Winchester in 1345. 
 
 To reach Ludlow from Orleton the natives take the lane 
 from the church end of the village, through Comber ton and 
 Woofferton, which they call the lower road, but, though 
 much more hilly, the upper one is shorter and far more 
 beautiful. To reach it we take a side lane near the Boot 
 Inn, and crossing a little ford with footbridge, below the 
 mill, re-enter the main road at an inn with an old-fashioned 
 sign, the Maidenhead, and turn to the north. This road for 
 some miles runs parallel to the Vinnall range of hills, and is 
 very pretty. Richard's Castle village is about two miles 
 on the way, but the best part of it lies away from the road. 
 The church and some ruins of the castle have been already 
 described ; they stand about a mile away, at the top of a 
 very steep lane, and are finely situated. Unless very
 
 n8 LUDLOW TOWN AND NEIGHBOURHOOD. 
 
 enthusiastic, we shall now keep the main road, leaving 
 them for a future examination. Nothing calling for 
 remark occurs between here and Batchcott, which, with the 
 rest of the route, is described at page 76. 
 
 LUCTON. 
 
 If too long, this drive can be very much shortened, and 
 some fine country explored, by turning eastward when at 
 Mortimer's Cross, instead of west towards Shobdon. In 
 the first mile Lucton, famous for its school, is passed. 
 Lucton Chapel is a handsome building, but quite new, with 
 the exception of a fine Early English font and a monument 
 to the founder of the school. It stands on the right hand, 
 at some distance, and the school, a large, square Queen 
 Anne building, nearer to the road. The latter was founded 
 by John Pierrepont, vintner and citizen of London, 1708, 
 who, " being unmarried, and having, with the blessing of 
 God and the applause of men, gained a plentiful estate, 
 retired to his native place to dedicate the greatest part of 
 it to pious uses." 
 
 CROFT. 
 
 On our left the whole slope of Croft Ambrey is occupied 
 by the picturesque park of Croft Castle (Rev. W. T. Kevill- 
 Davies), which stands among avenues and clumps of 
 magnificent trees, and is from this side a somewhat un- 
 promising edifice. But following the road to the little 
 village of Cock Gate, where there is a lodge at the corner of 
 the park, an avenue a mile in length (of oaks of gigantic 
 girth for the first half, and the rest of venerable beeches) 
 approaches it from a better point. From the park there are 
 grand views of the neighbouring country, especially towards 
 Leominster, whose Priory tower is a prominent landmark. 
 Croft Castle is ancient, but has suffered alteration in modern 
 times. It is rectangular in shape, with an ivy-covered 
 round tower at each angle. The original curtain walls 
 remain, but have been pierced with a number of modern 
 sash windows, especially on the south side, which has been 
 embellished with eighteenth century Gothic projections. 
 On the north are considerable Elizabethan additions. 
 Near it is the church, an interesting little building, chiefly
 
 CROFT CASTLE AND CHURCH. 
 
 119 
 
 of the fifteenth century, but containing one or two windows 
 which are fourteenth century, and a few sixteenth. It has a 
 very quaint bell-turret of Jacobean style, with a leaden 
 ogee-shaped roof. The chancel has a good ancient roof, 
 and the entire gangway of the nave is paved with ancient 
 encaustic tiles. Against the north wall of the chancel is an 
 exceedingly fine altar-tomb of white freestone to one of the 
 Croft family. Upon it are two large effigies of a knight and 
 lady, and on the western end, which is carried up about ten 
 feet high and projects in two canopies over them, are niches 
 for ten smaller figures of saints and angels, seven of which 
 remain, and along the south side ten more. In the figure 
 of the knight the armour is a plain example of that in use at 
 the end of the fifteenth century. The only unusual feature 
 is the mentonniere, a continuation of the collar in front of 
 the chin, on which the helmet fitted. The lady wears her 
 hair in a reticulated head-dress, over which is a veil or 
 kerchief arranged in the pedimental form. There is no 
 
 CROFT CASTLE. 
 
 inscription, but the costume shows it to have been executed 
 about 1490. The only other tomb of interest is a slab to 
 Sir William Croft, who was killed in a skirmish near Stoke- 
 say Castle while fighting for King Charles in 1645. This 
 family is of great antiquity, having owned this property in 
 Saxon times. Sir Bernard Croft lived here in the reign of 
 Edward the Confessor. His successor, Sir Jasper a Croft, 
 was deprived of his estates by the Conqueror, but his
 
 120 LUDLOW TOWN AND NEIGHBOURHOOD. 
 
 descendants soon recovered possession, and continued at 
 Croft till towards the middle of last century, when the 
 estate was bought by Somerset Kevill-Davies, Esq., the 
 father of the present owner. 
 
 From Cock Gate the road goes east towards Bircher, a 
 small village of quaint farmhouses (one of which has an old 
 pigeon-house), at a point where the road makes a sudden 
 angle. Here we turn to the left, and join the Leominster 
 and Ludlow main road near Bircher Knowl, from which 
 point the route will be found described at page 117.
 
 CHAPTER XIV. 
 
 DRIVE THROUGH STOKE ST. MILBOROUGH TO BROWN CLEE, 
 TITTERSTONE, ETC. 
 
 Rock Green Dodmore Middleton Crow Leasowe Ascent 
 of Titterstone The Moor Stoke St. Milborough Cold 
 Weston Brown Clee Bouldon Heath Chapel Peaton 
 Corfham Castle Sutton. 
 
 LEAVING the town by Galdeford, the road begins a gradual 
 rise towards the hills, of which Titterstone is the principal 
 range, and is already conspicuous, standing purple and 
 dark behind the nearer field-covered heights. About half 
 a mile from the town, at a cluster of houses called Rock 
 Green, a footpath turns to the left between two cottages 
 and across a field or two to Dodmore, a Tudor, half-timber 
 farm-house. It has much ancient character, and one room 
 contains a fireplace of carved oak. The country opens out 
 immediately after passing Rock Green, and shortly after- 
 wards we turn to the left, at a point called Mount Flirt, 
 where the road forks, and at the next fork pass under the 
 little Bitterley railway, and over the Ledwyche Brook. 
 The railway is not for passenger traffic, but for bringing 
 down the celebrated Dhu Stone from the hill. The village 
 of Middleton lies a few hundred yards to the left. In it are 
 numerous old houses, and a small church, rebuilt in the 
 Norman style, but whether a copy of the old one or a new 
 design it is difficult to say. On the high wooded hill be- 
 yond the village, Downton Hall, a fine mansion, the seat of 
 Sir C. H. Rouse Boughton, Bart., is distinguishable through 
 a gap in the woods. The Clee Hill is from this side along 
 rocky edge, culminating to the north in a grand crater-like 
 mass. Rather more than a mile from Middleton, Crow 
 Leasowe, a pretty seventeenth century house, is passed on 
 the left. A row of fine trees leads to it from the road, and 
 in front of the house is an oak of gigantic girth, about the 
 largest in the district. The chimneys, doorways, and 
 gables of the house are elaborately ornamented with 
 moulded brick. Round Thorn is the next group of houses 
 on the left, and here in making the ascent of Titterstone, 
 if the summit is aimed at is a good point to turn off.
 
 LUDLOW TOWN AND NEIGHBOURHOOD. 
 
 DODMORE. 
 
 TITTERSTONE. 
 
 The lane is narrow and crooked which leads from here 
 to Clee Stanton, where there are one or two farms at the 
 foot of the mountain, at which a vehicle can be put up 
 while the hill is explored. Very few fields then intervene, 
 and the open hillside is soon reached, covered with bracken 
 and crowned with crags, like its bigger brothers in Wales ; 
 for the basaltic rocks at this end, unlike the more southern 
 portion, are untouched, except by the action of the ele- 
 ments, and the splintered and shapeless masses that have 
 toppled from the upper ledges lie in a slope of wreckage, 
 which is far from easy to climb. On the apex itself a group 
 of huge blocks is traditionally known as the Giant's Chair ; 
 the whole scene being weird and savage to a degree sug- 
 gestive of the goblins and malignant spirits which were 
 supposed to haunt this spot, which the foxes have now to 
 themselves. It is said that a rocking stone once existed 
 here, and that from it the name of Titterstone is derived. 
 There is a bank surrounding the space on the summit, and 
 a number of smaller circles within, all having the appearance 
 of artificial enclosures, though not sufficiently well pre- 
 served to be explainable. Coal was got here with other 
 minerals in the time of Leland, but in recent times the supply 
 has run short, except on the north-east and south slopes, 
 and at Knowbury, where the pits are still worked.
 
 STOKE AND COLD WESTON. 123 
 
 Adequate description of the scenery visible from here 
 being out of the question in the space allowable, it must 
 suffice to enumerate briefly the main points of interest. 
 The day being only moderately clear, a great extent of 
 varied landscape is visible ; in thick weather, of course it 
 is greatly limited, though still beautiful ; when absolutely 
 clear, sixteen different counties, with their landmarks, 
 besides towers and villages innumerable, are readily made 
 out. Ludlow, always charming, is seen as if it lay in a 
 hollow amphitheatre of woods and hills, instead of its 
 usual elevated site ; beyond, the heights of Radnor Forest 
 and the Beacon, with the Black Mountains in Breconshire 
 and the Sugar Loaf near Abergavenny to the south-west. 
 Southward, the Knowl buttress of the Hill stretches a 
 great distance, and where it dies off into the Teme Valley, 
 can be seen the little town of Tenbury, with St. Michael's 
 College at Oldwood, and the distant plateau to the east of 
 Leominster. More to the east, the Abberley hills with the 
 camp on Woodbury Hill, and the distant valley of the 
 Teme fading away towards the Severn, and the Malvern 
 Hills, on whose sides the houses can be distinctly seen. 
 Still more eastward, the glittering roofs of Witley Court 
 and the grey towers of Worcester. Among undulating 
 banks and hollows, the spire of Cleobury Mortimer 
 " standythe," as Leland says, " in the Rootes by Est, of 
 Cle Hills," with the Royal Forest of Wyre stretching dark 
 beyond, and, still more remote, the heights of Kinver Edge. 
 Bewdley, Kidderminster, and Stourport, can readily be 
 identified on the same side. Northwards the rival peak of 
 Brown Clee (1,806 feet) stands boldly forth, but the view 
 extends over Corve Dale, beyond Wenlock Edge and 
 Siefton Forest to the Longmynd and the Wrekin. 
 
 STOKE ST. MILBOROUGH. 
 
 Beyond Round Thorn, nothing calls for remark till 
 Lower Moor is reached, an old house with an immense 
 stone chimney, and a carved coat of arms. On the same 
 side is the Moor, a large white house, the residence of Capt. 
 W. Kevill-Davies. Just beyond on the opposite side is 
 an old farmhouse of timber, with some remarkable windows 
 and chimneys at the back, and very picturesque. A little
 
 124 LUDLOW TOWN AND NEIGHBOURHOOD. 
 
 further is the turning to Stoke St. Milborough,* and Clee 
 Downton is still higher up the main road. At the latter 
 place are some good seventeenth century houses of stone, 
 and wildish scenery. We now turn off down the lane to 
 Stoke, and dipping down into the valley, follow its windings 
 by the brookside for more than a mile, and then turn to 
 the left towards an old stone and timber mill, which we 
 see to be ancient by the old dripstones, over which the 
 square grey tower of the church is conspicuous. The 
 village is romantically situated, but except the church only 
 moderately pretty. The latter has a fine Early English 
 tower, upon which a stage has been added in the fourteenth 
 century. The arches within are very good instances of the 
 earliest phase of Early English, and there are many four- 
 teenth century windows of good and unusual design. In 
 front of the old timber porch is a slab with a geometrical 
 cross partly incised and partly sculptured. By taking the 
 steep lane which climbs the slope on the north of the 
 church, and turning to the left at the top of the first bank, 
 the long ridge of Weston Hill is surmounted, and quite 
 suddenly, without the slightest warning, on emerging 
 from the thick hedgerows which shut in the lane, a view of 
 exceeding grandeur bursts upon us. The wide vale of 
 Corve is spread out before us, and from Abdon Burf on the 
 right, across the whole range of Wenlock Edge to the 
 Stretton Hills and the Longmynd, the view is without 
 limit, and only partially disappears as we descend the un- 
 fenced road to Cold Weston. The little Church of that 
 name lies across the fields a few yards, and is one of those 
 rude Norman Chapels which are not uncommon in the 
 county. It has a good octagonal font, some windows, and 
 a north door, which are Norman ; but a number of modern 
 lancets have been added. A mile or so farther, the views 
 are still good, and to the right, indications that we are 
 drawing near the village of Clee St. Margaret. At the 
 corner of the road is a queer old house projecting over the 
 path ; another has a stone sign announcing it to be the 
 Leg of Mutton Inn, but it is an inn no longer ; beyond is a 
 footbridge and mill where the road crosses the rocky bed of 
 
 * St. Milburga was the daughter of Merewald, founder of Leomin- 
 ster Priory, and granddaughter of Penda, the great King of Mercia. 
 She was prioress of Wenlock, and was buried there in the seventh 
 century.
 
 STOKE AND COLD WESTON. 
 
 125 
 
 the stream, and at the same point is a footpath to the 
 church, its wooden bell-cot already showing over the or- 
 chards. There is a quantity of Saxon herring-bone work in 
 the chancel, and a few features which are possibly also pre- 
 Norman, viz. : south door, and oddly shaped and narrow 
 priests' door ; very good little Early English chancel arch, 
 with wooden doors, square hagioscopes on each side, carved 
 pulpit, and a number of very good early benches a thing 
 very rarely seen ; also curious fourteenth century window 
 without tracery, and plain circular font. Of the two peaks 
 of Brown Clee, which rise a few miles to the east, Abdon 
 Burf is the principal, and 1,805 ^ eet above the sea. There 
 are evidences on the summits of what must have been pre- 
 historic fortifications, there being remains of a number of 
 hut-circles, and a huge vallum of stone, 1,317 feet by 660 
 feet. Between Abdon Burf and this village, and about a 
 mile to the east of the latter, is Nordy Bank, a well-defined 
 Roman camp, and one of the most perfect remaining. 
 A deep fosse encircles it, and there is a vallum with a slope 
 of twelve feet. From here (Clee St. Margaret) it will be 
 best to turn north-west for about a mile to the village of 
 Bouldon, where is the only inn of this inhospitable region. 
 Horses may rest here, and refreshments be ordered, while 
 we explore the neighbourhood. A lane that winds up the 
 hill to the north-west will conduct us in about a mile to the 
 
 
 THE HEATH CHAPEL.
 
 126 
 
 LUDLOW TOWN AND NEIGHBOURHOOD. 
 
 Heath Chapel. By the side of a small stream that rattles 
 down a deep and tortuous channel, between the roots of 
 large trees, the lane climbs steeply the greater part of the 
 way, and towards the top turns to the right towards the 
 Heath House, which for some time has been visible through 
 the trees on the shoulder of the hill. A short distance past 
 the entrance to Heath House (Henry Downes, Esq.) the 
 Heath Chapel stands in a field to the left of the road. 
 
 Here we have the rare opportunity of seeing an early 
 Norman fabric, without the changes and incrustations 
 which passing centuries have, very often to their improve- 
 ment, added to nearly all our buildings of that period. It 
 is almost the unique instance of a church of that date 
 retaining its primitive condition untouched. Externally 
 the walls are relieved by flat buttresses at each angle and 
 in the middle of each wall-face. The windows are all 
 small and plain, with the exception of a square hole cut in 
 the north wall in the churchwarden era. The only door is 
 a large and fine one, with nook-shafts and rich chevron 
 mouldings, and has its original ironwork and primitive lock. 
 It admits into the south side of the nave, which is filled 
 with fine Jacobean pews, most of them carved. The pulpit 
 and reading-desk are of the same, and carved to match, 
 but the seats at the extreme west, and those at south side 
 of the chancel, have much earlier decoration, and seem 
 from the size and character of the timbers to have been 
 portions of a fifteenth century rood-loft. The chancel is 
 
 cinonn 
 
 mmo 
 
 INTERIOR OF THE HEATH CHAPEL.
 
 CORFHAM CASTLE. 127 
 
 separated by a large and elegant arch of several orders, 
 but of the severest simplicity, and the string-course which 
 we noticed without is repeated round the wall-surface. 
 The font is of the same early character as the building, and 
 has some indications or arcading. Communion table and 
 rails, pews, reading-desk, and pulpit are alike guiltless of 
 varnish or French polish, and on all there rests the profound 
 repose of an undisturbed antiquity. In the plain white- 
 washed walls of this homely hillside sanctuary there is a 
 solemnity and impressiveness often wanting in more pre- 
 tentious structures of recent times. Its hoary stones are 
 eloquent to-day of the time when this outlying barbican of 
 the Clee was a heath in fact as well as in name, when the 
 black-cock and the grouse roamed on the slopes, and there 
 was heather instead of corn on the uplands. 
 
 The engraving, which was made for a work by the late 
 Mr. Wright, gives but a faint idea of the interior. Service 
 is held here once a month. Returning down the hill, we 
 notice a new church of corrugated iron in the village of 
 Bouldon, and cannot refrain from the reflection that it will 
 scarcely look so well as the one we have left does after seven 
 hundred odd years have passed. 
 
 Duly fortified by rest and refreshment, we make a start 
 for the return journey, down the eastern side of Corve Dale. 
 Peaton Strand is a small hamlet of old houses half a mile 
 on the road, and another cluster the same distance beyond 
 is Peaton. Here also is the once celebrated Corfham 
 Castle, now distinguishable only by its earthworks, which, 
 however, are extensive and well marked. It stood on the 
 high ground on the east bank of the Corve, and was the 
 centre of the great manor of Corfham, which Henry II. 
 gave to Walter de Clifford " for love of Rosamond, his 
 daughter." A free chapel within the castle of Corfham 
 existed as late as 1635, but was then in decay. At Bron- 
 croft, two miles north of here, there is another castle, 
 prettily situated in a park. In 1645 it is spoken of as 
 having been demolished by the Royalists, but it is now 
 rebuilt and converted into a residence for the owner, Miss 
 Johnstone. Still following the road, a long interval ensues 
 without sign of dwellings, except on the distant slopes of 
 Wenlock Edge, where an occasional village or country seat 
 is visible : and the hamlets of Great arid Little Sutton,with 
 Sutton Hill rising at the back, where Mr. Wright unearthed
 
 128 
 
 LUDLOW TOWN AND NEIGHBOURHOOD. 
 
 on the summit some interesting evidences of an Anglo- 
 Saxon burial-ground. Then Lower Hayton is passed, the 
 only visible portion of a large and straggling community of 
 cottagers, called Hayton's Bent, which dots the hillside for 
 a long distance. Still farther, nearly opposite Stanton 
 Lacy, is Hope Gutter, one of those beautiful little valleys 
 so numerous in these parts, containing many picturesque 
 cottages. The road is then without great interest, except 
 in point of distant scenery, which improves as Ludlow is 
 approached and becomes a part of it. 
 
 .' 
 
 SAXON DOORWAY AT STANTON LACY.
 
 CHAPTER XV. 
 
 DRIVE THROUGH CORVE DALE. 
 
 Corve Bridge Site of Norman Chapel Tumuli on Oldfield 
 Stanton Lacy Saxon Work Churchyard Tombs Vil- 
 lage Manor-house The Lacys Culmington Elsich 
 Delbury Holgate, &c. Munslow Upper Millichope . 
 
 " PASSINGE out of Ludlowe by Corve-gato," says Leland, 
 " I came straight to Corve Bridge, of five fayre arches of 
 stone." If we follow in his footsteps to-day we shall find 
 the bridge was rebuilt in the last century, and that its arches 
 are now three, and anything but fair. Descending Corve 
 Street, which takes its name from the little river flowing at 
 the bottom, and crossing the bridge, which was partly 
 built with stones from the old chapel of St. Leonard just 
 above, we have two miles of wide and level highway before 
 us, planted with oaks on either side a very pleasant run 
 for the cyclist, but a trifle monotonous. More than half 
 of it has been traversed when Rye Felton Farm is passed on 
 the right, just across the railway. Near it the site of a 
 Norman Chapel has lately been discovered, the traditional 
 name of Chapel Field being thus explained. It seems to 
 have been a plain rectangular chamber nearly thirty feet 
 long, with a semicircular apse of another six feet. Numer- 
 ous skeletons were unearthed, and some good tiles, but no 
 gravestones or coffins. At the end of the second mile we 
 turn off to the right, over the railway arch, and enter a 
 large open space, called the " Old Field," and now used as 
 a racecourse. Taking the easternmost of the diverging 
 tracts, we notice, in crossing, four well-marked tumuli in 
 a row close to the road. These have recently been examined 
 (December, 1884) by Mr. C. Fortey. In the first, which is 
 large and detached from the others, was found an urn of 
 elegant shape, with traces of ornament and filled with burnt 
 bones, the rim having an internal ledge for a lid ; below it 
 a small cist was found of flat stones. In the next was a 
 small quantity of bones and ashes, and in the end one a 
 larger quantity and a bronze ornament. To the north- 
 west is a larger mound, called " Robin Hood's Butt," the 
 tradition being that that popular hero discharged his bow
 
 130 
 
 LUDLOW TOWN AND NEIGHBOURHOOD. 
 
 from that spot at the tower of Ludlow Church, which is 
 very visible in the distance, and that the arrow, falling short, 
 stuck in the gable of the north transept, where it still 
 remains.* This was also examined by Mr. Fortey, and at 
 a depth of ten feet a heap of burnt bones and charcoal was 
 found, a bed of clay followed, and, two feet below, a layer 
 of ashes. Among the bones, those of a child of ten or twelve 
 years were identified, and a bronze spear-head. 
 
 STANTON LACY. 
 
 Soon after reaching the edge of the " Old Field," the 
 square grey tower of Stanton Lacy, though distant still, 
 is conspicuous in front of dark trees, all the more so as the 
 country hereabouts is flat and wanting in special land- 
 marks. For the same reason Whitbatch and other rising 
 grounds become important, and rival the distant Bringe- 
 wood and Vinnall Hills. The road once regained, a short 
 mile brings us to the lane, up which the church is seen with 
 the Corve flowing past it. 
 
 TOMBS OF THE LACVS, STANTON LACY. 
 
 Of churches with Saxon architectural features this 
 island can boast but few. They can almost be counted on 
 the fingers, yet Stanton Lacy is one of them. The original 
 building appears to have been cruciform in plan, as they 
 
 * The real explanation of the arrow has already been given. (See 
 foot-note on page 25).
 
 DRIVE THROUGH CORVE DALE. 131 
 
 very often were, Saxon masonry being traceable in nave 
 and south transept ; and the lines of narrow, projecting 
 stones, characteristic of that style, are particularly 
 noticeable in the west and north walls of the nave, and 
 in the latter is a fine Saxon door with a curious cross over it. 
 In the west end of the south wall of the aisle are two ob- 
 tusely pointed recesses, and under them two ancient stone 
 slabs, one incised with a geometrical cross and the other 
 with a foliated one sculptured in relief, but much worn. 
 There are two similar arches in the outer face of the chancel 
 wall, but later and more elaborated, and under them two 
 figures, apparently of the thirteenth century, but con- 
 siderably abraded. These external monumental arches 
 are often met with, more particularly in this district, but 
 it is exceedingly rare to find the tombs still under them. 
 Both of those in the chancel wall were in fair condition till 
 about 1850, when an individual, who ought to have known 
 better, sought to obtain a cheap immortality by having 
 himself buried under one of them ; but on wrenching off 
 the sculptured figure, and thereby breaking it through the 
 middle, there was found, in a stone coffin, the skeleton of a 
 man of great size. On this the idea was abandoned, and 
 the damaged stone replaced. This is the more interesting 
 from the existence of an old tradition that one of the Lacys 
 was seven feet high. It is probably the tomb of the last 
 Lacy, who died in 1241, and the earlier ones in the south 
 aisle must certainly be memorials of his ancestors. 
 
 The central tower is plain and square, with two two-light 
 windows in each face. There are a number of good Early 
 English lancets and Early Decorated windows in different 
 parts of the church, which is not so very picturesque, in 
 spite of its great antiquity, except on the north side. The 
 village of Stanton Lacy requires some time and patience to 
 explore, as its cottages are completely buried in orchards 
 and other thick foliage. It was the seat for many genera- 
 tions of the great family of De Lacy, the remains of whose 
 manor-house form part of the residence of Mrs. Hodgson 
 in the centre of the village. They are chiefly foundations, 
 but immensely thick walls and great beams of oak attest 
 the antiquity of a great part of the house. 
 
 Concerning the foundation of the first church at Stanton, 
 an old legend says that Milburga, the pious grand-daughter 
 of Penda, King of Mercia, whose beauty attracted many
 
 132 LUDLOW TOWN AND NEIGHBOURHOOD. 
 
 suitors, was staying at Stoke, when one of the latter, a. 
 Welsh prince, determined to carry her off, which she hear- 
 ing of fled towards Wenlock, and, being closely pursued by 
 him, had crossed the Corve where the church now stands. 
 Falling on her knees, she prayed that the river might 
 become an impassable torrent ; and her prayer being heard 
 and the pursuers baffled, she built there a church about 
 680 A.D. In Domesday Book Stanton is minutely described. 
 Roger de Lacy then held it ; his father, Walter, was one of 
 the heroes of the battle of Hastings. His brother Hugh 
 succeeded to the estates on his banishment in 1095. He 
 was succeeded by his nephew Gilbert, who died 1163. His- 
 son Hugh (second) had from Henry II. a charter con- 
 firming Stanton Lacy, Ludlow, and Ewias to him ; was- 
 assassinated in Ireland, 1185. After being temporarily 
 escheated, the estates were restored to Walter, his son, in 
 1189, who lost them in rebelling against King John, but 
 recovered them on paying a fine. He died in 1241, leaving- 
 two granddaughters, Matilda and Mary, who divided the 
 estate. Matilda married Peter de Geneva, and, after,. 
 Geoffrey de Genville, who both held Ludlow. 
 
 CULMINGTON. 
 
 Leaving by the lane through which we approached it r 
 and turning north, past a queer old thatched house, and. 
 through a tract of well-timbered valley silvery with willows, 
 down which the Corve follows a tortuous channel, often near 
 to the road, we pass on the left a fine old timber house,, 
 called Langley, with a modern porch and a pool covered 
 with water-lilies, and soon after a singular stumpy-looking 
 object becomes discernible some distance ahead and slightly 
 to the right. Drawing nearer, it is seen to be a church 
 spire of stone, with two-thirds of its height missing, and 
 finished instead with a small one of wood. Turning up a 
 swampy lane and fording a large stream, the village of 
 Culmington is entered. It presents nothing more attractive 
 than the church, which stands on the right behind a red- 
 brick farmhouse, which is older than it looks. The steeple, 
 which forms such a strange object from a distance, is an 
 elegant and beautiful example of the Early English broach 
 spire ; indeed, the church is the best specimen of the First 
 Pointed style in the district. The tower is plain and square.
 
 DRIVE THROUGH CORVE DALE. 133 
 
 with small angle-buttresses, and the spire starts flush with 
 it from a row of plain corbels. The latter has a gabled 
 window in each face under a string-course, and the tower 
 
 CULMINGTON CHURCH. 
 
 has some small trefoiled openings, its weedy and untouched 
 condition making it a very beautiful subject for pencil or 
 camera. 
 
 Entered through the tower, the church is a narrow oblong, 
 undivided except by a fine Perpendicular carved screen. 
 It can be seen by close scrutiny that the latter is now east- 
 ward of its original place, as the acutely pointed windows 
 and string-course of the Early English chancel are continued 
 westward of it, and the old division is marked externally by 
 a curious projection, with a small window and two interior
 
 134 LUDLOW TOWN AND NEIGHBOURHOOD. 
 
 doorways, now blocked up, which was the staircase to the 
 rood-loft. In one of the north windows of the chancel is a 
 quaint Jacobean tomb, and opposite a very fine double 
 piscina and square aumbry. Further west is a wall recess 
 with rich mouldings and double row of ball-flowers. There 
 is carving and the date 1641 on some of the pews. A small 
 Early Norman door admitting to the vestry, in which is a 
 good register chest, is the oldest feature. 
 
 Passing through the village, we find it more interesting 
 than it promised ; and, turning to the left, re-enter the 
 main road. We now leave the Corve to the right, and 
 follow the course of a smaller stream nearly due north. 
 Wenlock Edge now comes into evidence, and the country 
 generally is getting hilly and broken. Brown Clee not 
 brown but purple appears over lower hills on the right, 
 and Titterstone, looking like a volcanic peak, reappears 
 above the nearer hills ; while to the left is Siefton Forest,, 
 with a tall tower upon its summit known as Flounder's 
 Folly. 
 
 Culmington Manor (the residence of E. Wood, Esq.,) a 
 large brick house in the modern Gothic style, stands on a 
 high bank at some distance. In about a mile and a half, 
 at a place called Pedlar's Rest, a lane on the right leads to 
 Elsich, the original manor-house of Corfton, a village 
 farther on. It is said to have been the home of John Talbot, 
 Earl of Shrewsbury, early in the fifteenth century, but 
 most, at any rate, of the present house is Tudor. It is a 
 very large and straggling place of limestone rubble, with 
 fine brick chimneys, but, unfortunately, all the windows 
 were restored in 1862. There is a remnant of the moat, 
 and on the same side a curious staircase turret with an 
 upper portion of timber and plaster. Inside is a staircase 
 of solid oak steps, some good panelling, carved fireplace, 
 and much fine old furniture. Corfton village is prettily 
 situated in a small dell to the right of the main road. It 
 possessed not a great while since as there are people 
 living who were married in it an ancient chapel, which is 
 now a roofless shell, with a few shapeless doors and windows, 
 but nothing to which a date could be assigned. Near to 
 the chapel yard, which is full of ricks, is the high mound,, 
 the ditch, and entrenchments of some forgotten fort or 
 castle. On the slope opposite Corfton is Corfton Hall, a 
 modern building in the Gothic manner, lately the residence
 
 DRIVE THROUGH CORVE DALE. 
 
 135 
 
 ELSICH MANOR HOUSE. 
 
 of the late Hugh Lloyd Roberts, Esq. A little beyond, 
 down a lane on the right, is the village of Diddlebury, or 
 Delbury, of which a pretty ford and foot-bridge, an old 
 farmhouse or two, a heavy Norman church tower peeping 
 over trees, and the park gates of Delbury Hall are the chief 
 features. The church quite bears out its first promise. It 
 would be difficult to find anything more quaint than the 
 tower, in which the windows, string-courses, and corbel- 
 tables of a late Norman work are nearly hidden by a 
 number of later staged buttresses added at various times, 
 which, while giving support, add greatly to its picturesque 
 effect. Its large semicircular west door has been built up, 
 and a smaller inserted in the thirteenth century. The nave 
 is divided from a south aisle by five pointed arches, from a 
 north transept by one plain arch, and from the chancel not 
 at all. There are numerous mural tablets in the chancel, 
 and a good arch for the Easter Sepulchre. In the south
 
 136 LUDLOW TOWN AND NEIGHBOURHOOD. 
 
 wall is a fine fourteenth century window, and in the south- 
 west angle a small square opening with a sill, which looks 
 like a low side window. Near it, a pointed priests' door and 
 Norman window. In the north wall of the nave is a great 
 deal of herring-bone masonry and a small Norman window. 
 The main road has to be rejoined, and then one mile brings 
 us to Munslow Aston, where there are an inn and a few old 
 houses. There was a church here at the time of the 
 Domesday survey. Aston Hall is a large stone house with 
 good chimneys and other Jacobean features, but modern- 
 ised. Munslow, another mile beyond, is a very pleasant 
 and attractive village, which was sufficiently important in 
 the reign of Henry I. to give its name to the division of the 
 county, or Hundred, in which it stands. A large inn at the 
 entrance is still called " The Hundred House," and for a 
 moderate journey it will be convenient to rest there, and 
 afterwards cross the Corve to Broncroft and Tugford, and 
 return on the east side of the valley. But if time should 
 allow, Shipton should be visited, though there is no longer 
 an inn there, and it can be reached within two miles by rail 
 from Longville station. At Shipton is a fine Elizabethan 
 hall, for centuries the seat of the ancient Mytton family, 
 and at Stanton Long and Holgate, on the way back, good 
 churches. In the latter, a beautiful Norman font and very 
 fine Norman south door. On the same high mound on 
 which the church stands stood the castle of Holgate, or 
 Helgot, built by Helgot de Stanton, and made use of by 
 Henry I. in 1109. It was destroyed by the Royalists in 
 1645. 
 
 MUNSLOW. 
 
 In any case, Munslow Church is worth seeing, up a lane 
 to the left, where it is very prettily situated on the slope of 
 a small valley, looking across which its square fourteenth 
 century tower, with small and simple belfry lights, pyramid 
 roof, and no battlements, is seen among the rectory trees, 
 with the ancient timber houses of the district dotted about. 
 Seldom is a more rural and picturesque churchyard met 
 with. The tombstones, many carved with quaint devices, 
 are clothed in luxuriant creeping growths ; one of them 
 has placed over it as a canopy the ancient timber lych-gate 
 which has been removed from its original place by sawing 
 through the pillars. The church itself is very interesting,
 
 DRIVE THROUGH CORVE DALE. 
 
 137 
 
 and, outwardly at least, extremely beautiful. Within, 
 much has been renewed, but many features remain ; for 
 example, a good incised slab (most unusual in this county), 
 and the curious Decorated windows in the north aisle, con- 
 taining a quantity of fine glass of slightly later date. On 
 the south side are two fine Decorated windows, one of them 
 of similar design to one at Richard's Castle, and a very fine 
 timber porch of the same period, draped with honeysuckle, 
 and opposite to it a quaint old sun-dial. 
 
 At Upper Millichope, two miles due north from Munslow, 
 is a curious twelfth century house, now used for farm 
 purposes. Its main walls are immensely thick. The 
 lower story is entered by a round-headed doorway, slightly 
 ornamented, near which is a small window deeply splayed. 
 There is a fireplace, and in one angle a stone staircase 
 worked in the thickness of the wall, which was defended by 
 three different doors. In the upper room are two curious 
 windows of Early English character, with seats in the 
 recesses. With the exception of the celebrated Jews' 
 House at Lincoln, there is hardly another instance of a 
 domestic building of such early character. 
 
 After refreshment at the Hundred House, we can return 
 down the other side the Dale by crossing at Beam Bridge 
 towards Tugford, where there is a mill, and an interesting 
 church with tower, nave, and chancel of the fourteenth 
 century, and some good external mural arches for tombs. 
 Beyond Tugford the route is given at page 127. 
 
 OLD SUN-DIAL, MUNSLOW.
 
 CHAPTER XVI. 
 
 DRIVE THROUGH ASHFORD, CAYNHAM, WHITTON, 
 WHITTON COURT. 
 
 Ashford House Caynham Court Camp Church Whitton 
 Court Whitton Chapel Hope Bagot Bitterley Church 
 Henley Hall. 
 
 THIS drive can be shortened by starting through Lower 
 Galdeford, past the Cattle Market, and following the direct 
 road to Caynham ; but if time is not an object, some very 
 good country is to be seen by following the Leominster 
 road as far as Ashford Hall (page 90) ; and turning over 
 the railway bridge. The river is then passed, and Ashford 
 Carbonell village (page 90). At the top of the ascent is a 
 fine view in several directions ; a large white house ahead 
 is Ashford House (Miss Hall), where there is a fine avenue 
 of elms and other large timber, and a herd of fallow deer. 
 At the cross road an old-fashioned brick house, with very 
 picturesque outbuildings, was an inn called the Serpent. 
 From higher ground still further, Titterstone, always 
 beautiful, is a great addition to the landscape, towering 
 above the minor heights of Caynham Camp and Knowl 
 Hill. In the hollow is a stream of some size flowing through 
 fine trees, in crossing which an old mill can be seen, with 
 Caynham Court in the background. Caynham Camp can 
 be visited by leaving the carriage at a wicket on the left, 
 just after passing the lodge gates of the Court (Sir William 
 M. Curtis, Bart.,) and going up the field to a stile in an old 
 orchard. By climbing straight up the hill, the first slight 
 entrenchment is gained, then the fosse, and a steep vallum 
 twenty feet high encircles a large space, with an entrance 
 at the east, and now cultivated. The earthworks them- 
 selves are densely covered with trees, but from the slopes 
 below there is an unobstructed view of magnificent extent. 
 This interesting British camp was several times fortified in 
 the Middle Aees (Leland says, " Kainsham Castle, clene 
 down, stood within two miles of Ludlow on a hill top ") 
 and was used as late as the time of Cromwell, who had 
 stores here during the siege of Ludlow. Returning down
 
 CAYNHAM CAMP AND CHURCH. 
 
 139 
 
 the hill, and passing the back of Caynham Court, the 
 vicarage is passed on the left, and then the church. Though 
 small, this church was a few years ago one of the best in the 
 district, but had got out of repair. It is now rebuilt, with 
 important additions in the Norman style. The old features 
 
 TRIPLE ARCH, CAYNHAM CHURCH. 
 
 which remain are a very curious triple Early English 
 chancel arch, the lower part of tower, good door therein, 
 and several lancets, all of that date, one or two Early 
 Decorated windows, a small Norman window and south 
 door. It is very much to be regretted that no photographs 
 were taken of the old church. 
 
 WHITTON. 
 
 The road now begins to rise towards the Clee Hills, and 
 the surrounding country is seen to great advantage. After 
 passing a pretty house near the road (Whitton House), we 
 turn to the right by a clump of Scotch firs, and along a lane 
 which winds between high banks for nearly a mile, and 
 again to the right, where there are two picturesque old 
 houses at the corners, along the old wall of Whitton Park, 
 over which the grand old gables and graceful chimneys of 
 Whitton Court are very socn apparent, though its fine 
 situation at the edge of a small ravine would hardly be
 
 140 LUDLOW TOWN AND NEIGHBOURHOOD. 
 
 suspected. The house is built of small Elizabethan bricks 
 with stone quoins, and encloses a small quadrangle, in 
 which is a stone portion with two fourteenth century 
 
 WHITTON COURT. 
 
 windows and some elaborate timber and plaster work. 
 The interior is exceedingly interesting, and contains many
 
 WHITTON CHAPEL. 141 
 
 old rooms in good preservation, and a great deal of fine 
 tapestry. Within the late brick porch, a fine fourteenth 
 century stone arch leads to a large hall of the same date, 
 across one end of which is a carved and panelled timber 
 screen of extraordinary massiveness, and a large fireplace 
 between the windows above mentioned. On the walls are 
 some very curious paintings. This beautiful old house, 
 which was in the Charlton family for many generations, has 
 been lately restored in the most conservative spirit, and 
 retains, down to the smallest details, its ancient character. 
 The dates 1611 and 1621 occur on the brick portions. It is 
 now the residence of Miss Mills. About a quarter of a mile 
 to the south of the park gate, Whitton Chapel stands alone 
 among the fields. It has a square tower of great simplicity, 
 without battlements and almost without windows, added 
 about the fourteenth century, and the east window is 
 similar in date. There is a south door with plain Norman 
 arch and tympanum, round which is the nail-head mould- 
 ing. Returning to the park, we follow the wall in an easter- 
 ly direction to an old timber farmhouse called Rollings, and 
 then to the left, till the little church of Hope Bagot appears 
 at the head of a small valley between the buttresses of 
 Titterstone. Passing the rustic old outbuildings of Hope 
 Court (Captain Giles), a Georgian brick house, the church 
 is reached by a footpath across an orchard. It is a small 
 edifice, with considerable Norman character, viz., a very 
 fine chancel arch, with nook shafts and elaborate sunk star 
 ornament, south door with plain tympanum, a small 
 window or two, and large cylindrical font. There is a good 
 early timber porch ; two single-light windows in the 
 chancel are thirteenth, the other fourteenth century. Very 
 interesting piscina and sedilia in the window sill ; good 
 Jacobean carved pulpit, and a curious fourteenth century 
 window in south wall of nave. 
 
 BITTERLEY. 
 
 From here the Knowbury buttress of the Clee Hill can 
 be crossed by going up the lane at the back of the church, 
 and winding up the slope towards the new church, and 
 across the network of fenceless roads and small tracks on 
 the hill. After joining the Cleobury road, turn along a 
 lane near the hamlet of Farden, and past a farm called
 
 I 4 2 
 
 LUDLOW TOWN AND NEIGHBOURHOOD. 
 
 Hilluppencott, to Bitterley Court and church, standing near 
 together on high ground, about a mile from the village ; 
 the former a quaint house hiding all traces of antiquity 
 under repeated coats of plaster. It has long been the 
 residence of the Walcot family, and contains many literary 
 treasures and interesting relics, including a pedigree of the 
 Walcots from 1316 to 1643. The church is a Norman 
 fabric, very much altered in modern times ; however, some 
 
 CHURCHYARD CROSS, BITTERLEY. 
 
 windows, a very fine font, and plain south door of that date 
 remain. There is also an iron-bound chest of the fourteenth 
 century, in which were found, some years ago, a pewter 
 flagon, paten, and alms box. The pulpit is Jacobean, the 
 lectern made from ancient woodwork, and the oldest
 
 BlTTERLEY CHURCH. 
 
 143 
 
 monuments seventeenth century, one to a Lucy of Charle- 
 cote. Near a fine yew in the churchyard is an exquisite 
 Decorated cross in such perfect condition as is very rarely 
 met with. Bitterley village is reached in a mile ; it has 
 many pretty houses, and a school founded by John New- 
 borough, Head Master of Eton in 1712. A short distance 
 this side Bitterley, a very queer old house, built of brick, 
 stands in a field ; it is of Jacobean date, with an octagonal 
 tower and stepped gables, and now occupied by cottagers. 
 
 There is very good scenery, but little more of note to be 
 seen from the narrow and tortuous lane, which brings us 
 out into the main road, opposite the iron gates and fine elm 
 avenue of Henley Hall. The latter is a large mansion of 
 the Queen Anne period, but contains some panelling and 
 fine ceilings of earlier date, and some old pictures. It is the 
 residence of J. B. Wood, Esq. The route from here to 
 Ludlow is described on page 121, and is not more than two 
 miles in length. 
 
 NORMAN FONT, BITTERLEY.
 
 CHAPTER XVII. 
 
 RAILWAY EXCURSION TO STOKESAY. 
 
 River Onny Onibury Craven Arms Newton Stokesay 
 Castle Its History Stokesay Church. 
 
 FOR Stokesay we take tickets for Craven Arms station, 
 seven miles north, and leave the town at its northern ex- 
 tremity. For two miles the railway runs so low as to leave 
 very little of the country in view, and by the time any is 
 visible, the Old Field has been reached, near the first station, 
 Bromfield, where there is no sign of the village but the 
 church tower and tall poplars near it, three parts of a mile 
 to the west. The river Onny, sparkling over great beds of 
 gravel, and swirling round deep pools and under tree-roots, 
 is always on our left till we reach Onibury, where we cross 
 it, and pass on along its other bank. Onibury is a small 
 village of half a dozen farms, as many thatched cottages, 
 and a small church. The latter has a plain square tower, 
 which can be seen from the train, and a nave and chancel, 
 chiefly fourteenth century, the best feature being a timber 
 porch of the same date, which is not improved by a slate 
 roof. A Saxon church was here at the time of the Domes- 
 day Survey. 
 
 CRAVEN ARMS. 
 
 Just before the train slackens to run into Craven Arms 
 station we catch a fleeting glimpse of the object of our 
 journey, Stokesay Castle, and from a side which gives it to 
 great advantage. Seen across a large, quiet pool, backed 
 up with the steep grey sides of Norton Camp, and grouped 
 with the grand elm-trees and rustic old church, it is a thing 
 to be remembered. The busy junction at Craven Arms 
 has made its mark on the surrounding locality, without 
 adding to its beauty. The village being entirely of recent 
 growth, and not at all interesting, we avoid it by turning 
 at once through a wicket in the right-hand corner of the 
 station yard, and follow a path at the back of the premises 
 of the large Georgian hotel, from which it takes its name.
 
 RAILWAY EXCURSION TO STOKESAY. 
 
 145 
 
 This brings us to the main road, which runs parallel to the 
 railway. Newton, a small village to the left, was a fine old 
 place full of good houses till the modern Craven Arms 
 encroached upon it. Nothing calls for special attention on 
 the way, for although the hills are high and bold, and the 
 castle occupies high ground in the centre of the valley, the 
 road does not enable them to be seen to advantage, and is 
 rather prosaic in itself. Not a mile from the station, it 
 crosses an iron bridge over the Onny, and in the angle of the 
 road is the parish school-house. Passing the latter, a lane 
 
 STOKESAY CASTLE AND CHURCH. 
 
 leads up the bank to a group of trees, where there is a stile 
 into the churchyard. This side of the church is not striking, 
 but on passing round its eastern end, he must be indeed a 
 Goth who is not struck by the first view of the old manor- 
 house. For from the deep moat which bounds the tangled 
 grass and grey tombstones of the churchyard there springs 
 a strange un-English looking pile of loopholed walls and 
 high-pitched overhanging roofs and gables. The long 
 central ridge, picturesquely broken by the tall window
 
 146 
 
 LUDLOW TOWN AND NEIGHBOURHOOD. 
 
 gables of the great hall, leads the eye to the high battle- 
 mented tower at the far end, and the quaint timber gate- 
 house enriched with strange carved devices standing in the 
 outer wall. 
 
 STOKESAY CASTLE. 
 
 A description of this place such as it deserves would 
 require a volume to itself. The great and paramount in- 
 terest of the building is the fact of its thirteenth' century 
 
 STOKESAY CASTLE, FROM THE CHURCHYARD. 
 
 character, and its perfect preservation, having neither fallen 
 into ruin nor suffered alteration or renewal in modern
 
 RAILWAY EXCURSION TO STOKESAY. 147 
 
 times. We have no early manor-house existing to compare 
 with it in completeness and continuity of style. The 
 beautiful banqueting hall is itself without a parallel except 
 among our baronial castles. Crossing the narrow gangway 
 which replaces the old drawbridge, the courtyard is entered 
 through the gatehouse before mentioned, on the arch of 
 which, among other ornamentation, is a carving represent- 
 ing the temptation of Adam. The main buildings extend 
 along the far side of the court, and terminate in a large 
 tower at the northern end, and a mass of projecting timber 
 and plaster work at the other. The banqueting hall, 
 which is in the centre, is entered by a large pointed door 
 near its northern end, and is a room of noble and lofty pro- 
 portions, lighted by three tall windows on either side, of 
 the simplest form of tracery, viz., two pointed lights with a 
 circular one above. There have been two shorter ones at 
 the north end, but one over the entrance door has been 
 built up. At the upper end of the room is a shoulder- 
 headed door communicating with the private apartments, 
 and in the centre of that part of the floor is the octagonal 
 hearth on which the fire was made, the smoke escaping, in 
 the absence of a louvre, as it could, through the chinks in 
 the roof. The timbers of this roof, which are blackened 
 with the smoke of six hundred years ago, rest on six long 
 stone corbels, which are, like the rest of the hall, of later 
 Early English design. At each end the timbers are carried 
 across the end walls, whose surface they beautifully relieve, 
 on two smaller stone brackets of exquisite form. 
 
 At the north end a doorway leads down a short flight of 
 steps to a lower chamber, in which is a well ; and over the 
 doorway a staircase of primitive type is supported on 
 timber framing and plain gallows-like brackets, the steps 
 being blocks of solid oak. The first landing admits through 
 a shoulder- headed door to some rooms overlooking the 
 churchyard. In one of them, which has an ogee-headed 
 window inserted, is a floor of very interesting tiles. The 
 other windows are small lancets of early character, little 
 more than loops. The upper part of the staircase has a 
 landing which may have served as a minstrels' gallery, and 
 gives access to a large and well-lighted room with an open 
 timber roof and an Early English hood fireplace. This end 
 of the building is rather puzzling, but it is probable that the 
 lower part was originally carried up to form a tower-like
 
 148 
 
 LUDLOW TOWN AND NEIGHBOURHOOD. 
 
 projection,, and that this upper story was rebuilt in timber 
 and plaster work, and projected on brackets during altera- 
 tions in the sixteenth century. At the other end of the 
 Hall are some interesting rooms, with cellars or dungeons 
 
 DOORWAY OF GREAT HALL, STOKESAY. 
 
 under them. They are also accessible from the courtyard 
 by a shoulder-headed door. Near it an external staircase 
 leads to the dining-room through a similar door, and also
 
 RAILWAY EXCURSION TO STOKESAY. 149 
 
 across a bridge and through a larger pointed door to the 
 tower. The dining room, unlike the rest of the building, 
 has its primitive character veiled by seventeenth century 
 panelling and other decoration of considerable richness, 
 particularly the fireplace, which has the original stone arch 
 surmounted by a gorgeous mass of carved wood, retaining 
 many traces of gold and colouring. From this room, 
 which has eight windows, open others towards the tower, 
 which however, has no direct communication with other 
 parts of the building, being practically detached, so as to 
 form an isolated stronghold for emergency. It has a most 
 singular design, resembling in plan a pair of irregular 
 octagons, and has three stories, each designed to have 
 separate entrances. The basement is entered from the 
 south-east corner of the courtyard, under a pointed arch, 
 and is a large chamber following the outline of the tower, 
 and lighted by six lancet windows. It was formerly used 
 as a blacksmith's shop when the castle was in use as out- 
 buildings by a neighbouring farmer, and in consequence 
 took fire, and was in danger of complete destruction ; as it 
 was, the partitions in the different stories were burnt, so 
 that their internal arrangement cannot now be seen. The 
 second is a similar room to the basement, similarly lighted, 
 and the upper one is now in most respects the same ; but it 
 had a few years ago a feature of its own which made it 
 quite different. The tower then had a high roof which 
 was open below into this room, and starting from below 
 the battlements, and partaking of their irregularity of plan, 
 stood above them at its apex, and with its dark stone tiles 
 showing between the battlements, and relieving them, 
 alternately light and dark, added greatly to the beauty of 
 the different views of the tower. This roof, which was in 
 good repair, and was probably unique among the secular 
 buildings of the three kingdoms, has a short time since 
 (1880), for some inscrutable reason, been destroyed, and a 
 flat one of lead substituted at great expense. The internal 
 effect of the alteration is to give a flat and comparatively 
 low ceiling to the room, in place of the old lofty one. This 
 room, like the others, was intended to be entered by a large 
 door from the courtyard, but it is now blocked up, and a 
 late window inserted. This door and the one below must 
 have been approached from a staircase which stood near 
 the dining room as can be seen by the evidences on the
 
 150 
 
 LUDLOW TOWN AND NEIGHBOURHOOD. 
 
 wall there by means of drawbridges ; so that the tower 
 could be completely isolated at will. The three stages of 
 the tower were also in communication by means of a narrow 
 staircase in the thickness of the wall, which could readily 
 be stopped up, and which now is the only means of access 
 
 GREAT HALL, STOKESAY. 
 
 to the upper room and the battlements. While the 
 pyramidal roof remained, the embrasures were accessible 
 from a narrow gangway round it. Between them the wall 
 is pierced by very graceful loops or oilets for archers. A 
 flight of steps leads to a turret with similar openings. 
 
 In the courtyard is a deep well, which had some years 
 ago a Gothic canopy of oak. Late in the sixteenth century
 
 RAILWAY EXCURSION TO STOKESAY. 151 
 
 the high crenellated wall defending the court on this side 
 was taken down to its present level, and the timber gate- 
 house, with its rich carving and chequered walls, erected in 
 place of the stronger, but probably narrower gate tower. 
 A portion of this original wall can still be seen against the 
 tower, where it has been left to serve as a buttress, by 
 which it will be seen that the courtyard has been a much 
 stronger place than at present. The other staged but- 
 tresses at the angles, and those between the windows of the 
 hall, are additions made in the fifteenth century to support 
 the walls. The window opening at the south end of the 
 hall on the west side, reaches down to the floor level, and 
 has instead of tracery two transoms and wooden folding 
 doors, the lower of which are evidently ancient. As. the 
 moat is close to the building along this side, there must 
 have been another drawbridge here to make the door 
 available. The upper part of the opening has been tam- 
 pered with in modern times, but the lower looks like a 
 fifteenth century alteration. 
 
 At the Conquest, Stoke was held by Mildred of Edric 
 Sylvaticus, but on Edric joining a Welsh rebellion, it was 
 bestowed on Roger de Montgomery. At the death of 
 Roger's successor, it again fell to the Crown, and was given 
 to Walter de Lacy, who bestowed it on the family of Say 
 of Richard's Castle. It is first called Stoke Say in a grant 
 of the advowson to Haughmond Abbey, by Theodric de 
 Say, in 1156. On the accession of Henry III., Stoke Say 
 had reverted to the Lacys, who held it till 1240, when, as 
 shown under Stanton Lacy, the estates were divided 
 between two grand-daughters ; the youngest marrying 
 John de Verdun, and receiving Stoke as part of her dowry. 
 De Verdun died in 1274, and Stoke was then held by Regi- 
 nald de Gray, who in 1281 sold it to John de Ludlowe. 
 This family held it for many years, and in 1291 Laurence 
 de Ludlowe had licence to build a wall of stone and lime at 
 his mansion of Stoke Say, and crenellate or embattle it. 
 This has been taken by several writers to refer to the forti- 
 fying of the house, and therefore, in the absence of an 
 embattled wall, to the building of the tower, and this has 
 led to difficulties as to dates, because, apart from the early 
 character of the building, there is mentioned in a roll of the 
 household expenses of Richard de Swinfield, Bishop of 
 Hereford, from 1289 to 1290, that he rested at Stokesay
 
 152 LUDLOW TOWN AND NEIGHBOURHOOD. 
 
 for ten days, with a retinue of thirty-six horses, and men in 
 proportion, showing that the place was then considerable, 
 and probably its present size. This difficulty is obviated 
 
 ENTRANCE GATE, STOKESAY. 
 
 by the evidence I have pointed out of an embattled wall 
 having existed round the courtyard, one side of a loophole 
 and a garde-robe being still visible, which was doubtless 
 the wall mentioned in the licence. I think there can be no
 
 RAILWAY EXCURSION TO STOKESAY. 153 
 
 doubt that the tower is earlier than 1291. The last of the 
 Ludlow family held it in 1498, and it then passed by the 
 marriage of his daughter to a Vernon of Haddon, who lived 
 here when Leland visited this district. He says : " Aboot 
 V. miles owt of Ludlo betwixt Ludlo and Bishop Castle ; 
 Stoke Say belongeth sometime to the Ludlo's, now to the 
 Vernons, builded like a castle." The Vernons lived here 
 till 1607, when it was sold to Sir George and Sir Arthur 
 Mainwaring. Thirteen years later it was sold to Elizabeth 
 Craven and Sir William Craven, her son, in which family 
 it remained till about twenty years since, when it passed to 
 J. D. Allcroft, Esq., who resides at Stokesay Court. It 
 was inhabited till 1706. 
 
 STOKESAY CHURCH. 
 
 Unlike other buildings of the kind, Stokesay Castle has 
 no chapel, owing, no doubt, to the nearness of the parish 
 church. The latter presents externally a Norman building, 
 re-edified in the churchwarden era, but within has some 
 very interesting points. The south door, is plain and un- 
 touched Norman. The nave is filled with high oak pews, 
 many having carvings and quaint hinges, and in the chancel 
 is a fine Jacobean canopied pew with arched openings. 
 There are a few mural monuments of some age, the best 
 being in the outside of the chancel wall, having coats of 
 arms and an inscription to Alice Baugh, who died 1662. 
 There is a very good Early English tower-arch, but almost 
 hidden by an old gallery, and there is a good carved chair 
 in the chancel.
 
 CHAPTER XVIII. 
 
 RAILWAY EXCURSION TO TENBURY, AND WALKS TO 
 BURFORD, ETC. 
 
 Woofferton Easton Court Little Hereford Nunupton Up- 
 ton Court Middleton-on-the-Hill Brimfield Tenbury 
 Church Tombs St. Michael's Burford Tombs Knigh- 
 ton-on-Teme. 
 
 A DAY may be well spent in a railway excursion to Tenbury 
 and its neighbourhood. The line follows the course of the 
 Teme southwards, about five miles, to Woofferton (where 
 we leave the Shrewsbury and Hereford line for the Tenbury), 
 and then turns with it towards the east. The scenery is 
 very varied, and soon reminds us that we are in Worcester- 
 shire, most of the valley being given up to cherry orchards 
 and hop yards. The trench on the left, which might be 
 taken for an early entrenchment, is only the bed of a disused 
 canal. Close to Easton Court station, which takes its 
 name from a fine modern mansion on the high ground to 
 the left, the residence of Mrs. Tarratt, is Little Hereford 
 Church, but it is not seen to advantage from the line, being 
 really a most interesting edifice, and, but for a slate roof, 
 quite picturesque. The tower and nave are Early English 
 of an early type, the former having a fine west door, long 
 loop-like lancets, and double lancet belfry windows. It 
 seems, by the remains of corbels, to have had a parapet, 
 but has now a pyramidal roof. There is a Norman window 
 and a Norman font in the nave, which is entered by a fine 
 Early English south door, and there is a beautiful tower- 
 arch of the same date. The nave is divided from the 
 chancel by a thick wall, in which is a very low chancel-arch, 
 and above it a large built-up window recess, the sill of 
 which has a projecting slab with a piscina at its south end. 
 A little more to the south is a narrow doorway, giving 
 access by a staircase in the thickness of the wall, entered by 
 a door under the chancel arch, to the rood-loft. These are 
 very interesting evidences of an altar in the rood-loft, 
 when a rood-loft existed. They also show that the former 
 chancel was much smaller and lower than the present one,
 
 NUNUPTON AND MlDDLETON-ON-THE-HlLL. 155 
 
 which replaced it early in the fourteenth century. On the 
 north side of the chancel are two richly canopied recesses 
 for tombs, close together, and there is another of similar 
 date on the south side of the nave. All of them are richly 
 carved and moulded, and have pinnacles flat at the top for 
 figures. Under those in the chancel are modern inscrip- 
 tions, recording the burial of members of the Delamere 
 family early in the sixteenth century, and under the 
 easternmost a good incised figure of a lady, very unusual in 
 this district. There are three fine sedilia on different 
 levels, and a plain piscina. Two or three modern windows 
 are very bad. 
 
 WALKS FROM EASTON COURT. 
 
 It should be noted in passing that from this station some 
 very hilly and varied country is accessible. A walk may be 
 taken to Nunupton Oak, one mile due north ; Middleton- 
 on-the-Hill, three miles in the same direction, returning 
 over Brimfield Hill, through Brimfield, to Woofferton 
 station. There is a footpath from Easton Court station 
 over a footbridge behind the church, and up the hill for 
 about a mile, which makes a short cut for Nunupton Oak. 
 A short distance on the left is a fine old house, the centre 
 and porch half timber, and the two ends Jacobean brick 
 with ornamental gables. It is now very picturesque, but 
 extensive alteration is contemplated. The oak, having 
 been accidentally burnt, is now fallen. When standing, 
 its stem was seventy feet long, twenty-five feet in circum- 
 ference across the middle of the first length, and fourteen 
 feet across the butt. On the opposite side of the valley 
 another fine old house is very conspicuous, Upton Court 
 (H. Horton, Esq.) It is chiefly half-timber, with fine old 
 chimneys, and within has a good deal of late panelling, 
 some Dutch tiles and stained glass. 
 
 Middleton-on-the-Hill is a small village with rather 
 pretty surroundings, and a church, which, though small, is 
 a good specimen of an unrestored and nearly complete 
 Norman fabric. The original flat Norman buttresses 
 remain, five on each side of the nave and six in the chancel 
 walls. On the south side is a good Norman window, and 
 the south door with solid tympanum, north door with 
 chevron and pellet moulding ; the plain chancel arch, font,
 
 156 LUDLOW TOWN AND NEIGHBOURHOOD. 
 
 and tower-arch are all Norman. The tower is the full 
 width of the nave, very tall, and hung with thick masses of 
 ivy, the lower story lighted by Early English loops. Both 
 this tower and that of Little Hereford bear evidence of 
 having been built with a view to defence. Moor Abbey, a 
 mile further south, is a large seventeenth century farm- 
 house, but with no monastic remains apparent. From 
 Brimfield Hill, which is thinly wooded, are good views to- 
 wards Ludlow, the Clee Hills being fine objects, and the 
 Stretton Hills generally visible. Brimfield village is pretty, 
 in spite of an air of commercial prosperity. The church is 
 uninteresting, having been entirely rebuilt in the last 
 century, with perhaps the exception of the lower part of the 
 tower, which shows early masonry. In the Vicarage 
 garden is a fine Early English font. 
 
 In the two and a half miles from Easton Court to Tenbury 
 is nothing very noteworthy besides the tower of Burford 
 Church among the trees by the river. 
 
 TENBURY. 
 
 On leaving Tenbury station for the town, the old Rose 
 and Crown Inn, combining with the peep of church tower 
 and houses across the river, is the first picturesque object. 
 At this end of an old bridge is a handsome hotel, the Swan ; 
 at the other end the town begins. It is a small but lively 
 place on the right bank of the Teme, and, as a town, has 
 considerable antiquity, but the evidences of it have been 
 mostly swept away by the activity of this and the preceding 
 generation, so that an old street or two, the bridge, and 
 portions of the church, are nearly all that remain. 
 
 In spite of its new appearance, the church should not be 
 neglected, as it contains several very interesting effigies. 
 In the north wall of the chancel, under an exquisite four- 
 teenth century canopy, lies the small, cross-legged figure of 
 a knight in complete chain-mail. His head rests on a 
 lozenge-shaped cushion, and has the hood of mail drawn 
 over it. He wears a hauberk of mail, over which is a long 
 stircoat fastened by a narrow strap at the waist, and nearly 
 reaching the feet, which rest on a talbot. The sword is 
 suspended by a broad belt, and the shield is absent. The 
 hands are placed together on the breast, holding a heart 
 between them, and their covering of mail hangs down from
 
 TENBURY CHURCH. 
 
 157 
 
 the wrists. This beautiful monument is, except the face 
 of the figure, in perfect preservation. It is about the oldest 
 monumental effigy in the district, and perhaps the only 
 
 HEART SHRINE, TENBURY. 
 
 sculptured effigy in the kingdom which shows the mufflers 
 or gloves of mail hanging loose from the wrists, not, as 
 generally represented, on the folded hands. Probably it
 
 158 LUDLOW TOWN AND NEIGHBOURHOOD. 
 
 does not mark the burial-place of the person commemora- 
 ted, but was erected to contain the heart of some knight 
 who fell in the Crusades. It has been referred to by Nash 
 and other writers as a child in armour, but that is mani- 
 festly erroneous. 
 
 In the south wall of the south aisle is a gigantic effigy of a 
 knight somewhat similarly armed to the foregoing, but as 
 he lies in a recess in the wall, which has at some late period 
 been plastered up, only half the figure is visible, and it 
 cannot be properly studied. There is a large pointed 
 shield on the left arm, bearing the arms of the Sturmey 
 family : gules, a chevron between three mullets pierced, 
 argent. The legs are crossed, the surcoat is shorter than 
 in the smaller figure, and the mail has either never been 
 indicated or has worn off in the course of centuries. The 
 Sturmeys lived at Sutton Sturmey, near here, and were a 
 great family in these parts. 
 
 At the east end of the south aisle is a very elaborate 
 tomb, richly carved in alabaster, and in perfect condition, 
 on the top of which is a knight in Elizabethan plate-armour, 
 and his wife in the costume of the same period. Round the 
 sides are the coats of the family and their alliances, and on 
 the tilting-helm of the knight, on which his head rests, is 
 the family crest : an arm in armour, with the hand bare 
 holding a sword, which pierces a boar's head couped. On 
 the wall is this inscription : " Here lieth Thomas Acton, of 
 Sutton, Esquire, who at the age of seventy years depted. 
 this life Jan. 2, 1546 : and Mary, his wife, daughter to Sir 
 Thomas Laycon, of Willey, Knight, being of the age of 58 
 years, deceased April 28. 1564, having issue in their life- 
 tyme two sons, Launcelot and Gabriel, who died before 
 them in their infancy, and Joyce, theire only daughter and 
 heire, being then of the age of twelve years, was espoused 
 to Sir Thomas Lucy, of Charlcot, Knight, which dame Joyce 
 in dutiful remembrance of these her loving parents hath 
 erected this monument, 1581. T.A. M.A." The Sir 
 Thomas Lucy here mentioned was the Squire of Charlcote 
 whose enmity Shakespeare is supposed to have incurred, 
 and whom he afterwards satirised as Justice Shallow. 
 
 In 1645 a major in the army of Charles I. made notes of 
 the church in passing with the king's troops through 
 Tenbury, and from these it is certain that there was a great 
 deal of fine glass in the windows. It may have suffered at
 
 TENBURY AND BURFORD. 159 
 
 the close of the war from the Puritan fanaticism, and in 
 1770 a great flood threw down the nave and south aisle, 
 and much damaged the windows, organ, and monuments. 
 Even after this, when Dr. Nash made his collections, there 
 were, besides those mentioned above, other monuments and 
 stained glass. 
 
 On the north side of the chancel, entered by a Decorated 
 door, is an ancient vestry, over which has been a room 
 with a window opening into the chancel, probably an 
 anker-hold or domus inclusi. The tower at the west end is 
 Norman, except the battlements. The west door was 
 renewed in the restoration ; over it is a small Norman 
 window. The belfry windows have two openings, divided 
 by a baluster, and recessed under a round enclosing arch. 
 
 In recent years a mineral spring has been developed at 
 Tenbury, and a handsome pump-room, &c., built over it, 
 the water being found to have valuable medicinal properties. 
 
 At the Old Wood, about two miles from Tenbury, is the 
 celebrated St. Michael's College, founded and built by the 
 Rev. Sir F. A. Gore Ouseley, Bart. 
 
 BURFORD. 
 
 The bridge over Teme has been altered and added to at 
 various times, but the main arches are original, and of early 
 mediaeval work. At the end of the bridge opposite to the 
 town is a large tumulus, with three very fine oaks growing 
 upon it. It was the custom in early times to place such 
 tumuli at fords to mark their position. A footpath leading 
 from the bridge past this mound is the nearest and pleasant- 
 est way to Burford village, which is reached in about a mile 
 through riverside fields and hop-yards. The church, a 
 continuous oblong without aisles or chancel arch, is inter- 
 esting in itself, retaining many of its ancient features, 
 among them curious Early English sedilia and piscina and 
 a fine Perpendicular font ; but its chief attraction is a most 
 interesting series of tombs, chiefly to the Cornwall family, 
 who held this manor from a remote period. 
 
 The earliest is a brass on the north side of the altar, with 
 the figure of a lady boldly incised upon it. The date is 
 covered by a modern reredos, but from the costume it 
 certainly belongs to the latter half of the fourteenth century. 
 The figure is attired in the veil head-dress and a tight-fitting
 
 i6o 
 
 LUDLOW TOWN AND NEIGHBOURHOOD. 
 
 kirtle, over which is a long mantle, fastened by a cord. 
 The head rests on a cushion enriched with conventional 
 foliage in a beautiful pattern. Only part of the Norman- 
 French inscription is visible : " >J< Icy gist dame Elisa- 
 beth, feme a mon Elmon de Cornewaylle, q" mort. ..." 
 " Here lies Lady Elisabeth, wife to Sir Elmon de Corne- 
 waylle, who died ..." Under a fine sepulchral arch, en- 
 riched with crockets and ball-flower mouldings, in the north 
 wall of the chancel, is an alabaster effigy of a lady. She is 
 attired in a low-necked kirtle and mantle, her hair long and 
 confined by a fillet, her head resting on two cushions 
 supported by angels, and her feet on a dog. The colouring 
 of the figure, with the following inscription, have been 
 
 TOMB OF PRINCESS ELIZABETH, BURFORD. 
 
 restored : " Here lyeth the body of the Most Noble Eliza- 
 beth, daughter of John of Gaunt, Duke of Lancaster, own 
 sister to King Henry IV., wife to John Holland, Earl of 
 Huntingdon and Duke of Exeter, after was married to Sir 
 John Cornwaylle, Knight of the Garter, and Lord Stanhope. 
 She died the fourth year of Henry VI., 1426." In the 
 centre of the chancel is a wooden effigy of a knight in plate- 
 armour, his feet on a heraldic monster, and round the base
 
 TOMBS AT BURFORD. 161 
 
 the following : " Edmundus Cornewaylle, Thomae Corne- 
 waylle de Burforde, equitis aurati filius et haeres, obiit die 
 Januarii, anno domini Millesimo Quingentesimo Octavo, 
 aetatis suae Vicesimo. <%4 Requiescat in Pace." * 
 
 In the recess of the south-east window of the chancel is 
 an altar-tomb, whose upper surface is a thick sheet of lead, 
 on which is incised the figure of a lady under a curious 
 Gothic canopy. She wears the pedimental head-dress and 
 a flowing robe with ornamental girdle. A group of children 
 is squeezed into the bottom corner. This tomb has evident- 
 ly been executed by a maker of incised slabs, the whole 
 treatment being different from that of a brass. It is al- 
 together a most interesting example, and probably unique. 
 Round the margin is the inscription : " Here lythe Elys- 
 bethe debroke, dawtur unto Sr Walter debroke off Webbe- 
 lay, Knygth of the moste noble ordre, and lorde fferres of 
 Chartelay whyche Elsbethe was wyffe unto Sr Richard 
 Corbet of Morton, Knight, and after was married unto Sr 
 Thomas leyghton, Knigth, of Stretton In le dale whyche 
 Elysbeth depted. out of this transitory worlde In the yere 
 of owre lorde god a dmccccclvi., whose soule jsu have." 
 
 On the north side is a large monument in the most un- 
 usual form of a triptych. The doors and framework 
 externally are freely painted with representations of the 
 Apostles. Internally the principal group is painted upon 
 boards, and consists of three figures, life-size, in Elizabethan 
 costume, Edmund Cornewaylle and his father and mother. 
 There is a representation of a corpse below, many coats of 
 arms, and a long inscription. Tradition tells wonderful 
 stories of the size and strength of this Edmund ; he is 
 depicted 7 feet 3 inches high. The painting of this tomb 
 was the work of Melchior Salaboss, also known as Gerardino 
 Milanese. It is in perfect preservation, and of very great 
 interest, as there are but two others in the kingdom. 
 Round the walls are numerous interesting monuments, 
 Elizabethan and later, several containing well-preserved 
 effigies and curious epitaphs, entering, as was the fashion of 
 the times, into the chief incidents of the lives of the de- 
 ceased. One records the burial of a lady who " lived to 
 see seventeen score and more children raised from her body." 
 
 Under a pointed arch, with good mouldings, in the 
 
 * " Equitis aurati " indicated a rank of knighthood. Knights 
 were so called whose spurs were golden or gilt. 
 
 K
 
 l62 
 
 LUDLOW TOWN AND NEIGHBOURHOOD. 
 
 south wall, are two circular cavities with loose lids. This is 
 one of the few remaining instances of the mediaeval custom 
 of enshrining the heart of a great personage, who happened 
 to die abroad, in the wall of a church. This shrine con- 
 tained the heart of Sir Edmund Cornwaylle, Knight, who 
 died at Cologne in the fourteenth of Henry VI. The old 
 -covers have been replaced with modern ones. 
 
 KNIGHTON-ON-TEME. 
 
 Five miles north-east of Tenbury, in a picturesque and 
 hilly neighbourhood, is the small chapel of Knighton-on- 
 Teme, a very quaint building, containing many points of 
 interest. The tower is an oblong continuation the full 
 width of the church, divided from it by timber framing, 
 .and carrying a wooden upper part and the bell-cages on a 
 framework of thick beams. There are several Norman 
 features, as chancel arch with blind arcade, tall and narrow 
 south door with rich arcading above, and the fabric of 
 nearly all the walls. In the tower are two elegant Early 
 English lancets and one in the north wall, also a good 
 Decorated window in the south of nave with the Sturmey 
 arms over. 
 
 PERPENDICULAR FONT, BURFORD.
 
 CHAPTER XIX. 
 
 GEOLOGY OF THE NEIGHBOURHOOD. 
 
 FOR the study of the Silurian formations Ludlow presents 
 great facilities, with the additional advantage of being 
 close to the Old Red Sandstone and the very interesting 
 Carboniferous limestone and coal-measures of the Clee Hills, 
 which are surmounted by the basaltic rock so extensively 
 quarried under the name of Dhu stone. 
 
 We shall best obtain a comprehensive idea of the main 
 geological outlines of the vicinity by ascending to some 
 high central point, for which purpose the tower of the 
 parish church offers the greatest advantages. From it, we 
 look to the north into that remarkable district in which the 
 immense series of rocks known as Lower Silurian which 
 extends more or less interruptedly from the greater eleva- 
 tions of North Wales is broken into by the protrusion of 
 the hill we can see as a blue streak on the horizon, the 
 Longmynd, in which the Cambrian rocks rise from beneath 
 them. Beyond the great fault which runs down the Church 
 Stretton valley, the Lower Silurian (Ordovician) rise again 
 in the hummocky mass of Caer Caradoc, visible a little more 
 to the east, and then dip again to the south-east, and 
 disappear under nearer hills of higher formations, Wenlock 
 Edge and Callow Hill. These are Upper Silurian, consist- 
 ing of distinct groups of sandstones and shales, with bands 
 of concretionary limestone ; they also form the heights still 
 nearer, Norton Camp and View (Weo) Edge, and round to 
 the north-west, Mocktree Hill and the hills round Leint- 
 wardine and Downton, the dark line of Bringewood Chase, 
 and, nearer still, ^the steep sides of Whitcliff, and the pre- 
 cipitous ground over which we stand, are all composed of 
 Upper Silurian rocks. Southwards the hills round Aymes- 
 trey, the long ridge of the Vinnall range, the isolated group 
 of Caynham Camp and Tinker's Hill, and the three rounded 
 peaks of the Abberley Hills, which appear beyond the 
 latter in the extreme distance, are all of this formation. 
 To the east and north-east the prospect, geologically con- 
 sidered, presents very different features. From about the
 
 164 LUDLOW TOWN AND NEIGHBOURHOOD. 
 
 middle of the town below us, across the flat plain, and over 
 the rising grounds of Whitbatch as far as the slopes of 
 Wenlock Edge, and reaching far up into Corve Dale, east- 
 wards to the Clee range, and spreading southwards into the 
 great plain of Herefordshire, stretches a vast extent of Old 
 Red Sandstone. It overlies, south of Ludlow, the Upper 
 Silurian sandstone at Tinker's Hill, and on the east the 
 Carboniferous Limestone rests upon its upper beds. Above 
 it, in the slopes of the Titterstone Clee, rise in successive 
 stages the Millstone Grit, the Coal Measures, and finally 
 the basalt, which is spread over the summit. 
 
 CAMBRIAN. Recent investigations have shown the 
 existence in the Church Stretton district of a mass of rocks 
 called Archaic, which are believed to be of much earlier 
 date than any yet studied, though their exact history does 
 not seem to be very clearly ascertained. They are exposed 
 at Cardington, Hops Bowdler, and elsewhere, but the 
 earliest rocks which lie within a convenient distance of 
 Ludlow are the Cambrian, and the nearest places at which 
 they can be studied are round the southern end of the 
 Longmynd accessible from Craven Arms station in 
 which locality the Upper Llandovery conglomerate rests 
 unconformably on its lower slopes, and may be traced from 
 the eastern side at Little Stretton to Mindtown on the west. 
 The presence of this unconformity at its base, with other 
 indications, has led to the conclusion that the Longmynd 
 ridge was a high and steep island, rising from a former 
 Silurian sea. The worm-tracks, Arenicola didyma, are 
 found at Little Stretton, but no other organic remains. 
 
 LOWER SILURIAN (Ordovician). The Lower Silurian 
 may be seen near to Broome and Aston station, the first 
 from Craven Arms on the Central Wales line, where there is 
 a section of Hoar Edge Grits. They also occur at Carwood 
 and Broken Stones, a mile or two further north. Hordesley 
 Sandstones are exposed in the cuttings near Marsh Brook 
 station, at Long Lane, two miles west of Craven Arms, and, 
 one mile further north, the Cheney Longville Flags may be 
 observed on the west of the village of that name. Also the 
 Onny Shales in the river-bed at the same place, where many 
 fine fossils have been obtained, including Sphocrospongia 
 hospitalis. Some of the characteristic fossils to be found 
 in the above neighbourhoods are : Near Marsh Brook, 
 Glyptocrinus, Tentaclites Anglicus, Phacops conophthalmus,
 
 GEOLOGY OF THE NEIGHBOURHOOD. 165 
 
 Asaphus Powysii, Calymene Caractaci, Lichas laxatus, 
 Strophomena grandis, S. alternata, S. expansa, Orthis 
 Actoni(B, 0. Flabellulum, 0. vespertilis, Modiolopsis orbicu- 
 laris, Bellerophon bilobatus, B. sulcatinus, &c. At Longville, 
 Ampyi pennatus, Homolonotus bisculatus, Lingula termi- 
 granulata, Discina punctata, Orthis alternata, 0. unguis, 
 O. spiriferoides, Trinucleus concentricus, Remopleurides sp. 
 Fragments of Iloenus Davisii, Cyclocystoides Caractaci, &c. 
 
 LLANDOVERY. At the latter place, in the famous Onny 
 section, the Llandovery can be traced between the Wenlock 
 and upper beds of the Caradoc strata. The conglomerate 
 can be seen, as mentioned above, at many points between 
 Little Stretton and Mindtown, and its relation noted to the 
 Cambrian, against which it lies unconformably. At Long- 
 ville Iloenus Barriensis, I. Thomsoni, &c., are procurable in 
 the section exposed in the bed of the Onny. 
 
 The UPPER SILURIAN (Ordovician) is finely displayed in 
 the parallel ridges north of Corve Dale, where the Wenlock 
 shale, forming the greater part of Wenlock Edge, is crowned 
 on the crest by the harder Wenlock limestone. The 
 wearing down of the Lower Ludlow shale has formed the 
 valley between it and the parallel, but less continuous, 
 ridge, which is capped with Aymestrey limestone, the Upper 
 Ludlow shale succeeding it on the slope towards Corve 
 Dale. Similar features are traceable to the west and south- 
 west of Ludlow, where in the escarpments of the Vinnall 
 range the Wenlock limestone can be seen in quarries on the 
 eastern side, with the lower Ludlow overlying. On the 
 western side the Lower Ludlow shales, and farther west, 
 at Burrington, the Wenlock shales have been denuded, 
 iorming the valley of Wigmore Lake ; the hill above on the 
 north-west, Bringewood, being crowned with Aymestrey 
 limestone. The Upper Ludlow is well exposed near the 
 town itself. In the rocks under the Castle it is very access- 
 ible, and Homolonotus Knightii has been found. Near the 
 Ludford end of Whitcliff is a large quarry abounding in 
 fossil shells, and in the lane above, a long reach of the 
 celebrated Fish Bone Bed is visible, from which many 
 fragments of fossil fish have been unearthed. This bed 
 occurs at Downton Castle, and there is a very fine exposure 
 of it near Norton Camp, the hill above Stokesay Castle ; 
 above the bed is a layer of shale abounding in Platyschisma 
 and Modiolopsis Loevis. Nearly opposite Dinham Bridge
 
 166 LUDLOW TOWN AND NEIGHBOURHOOD. 
 
 the Aymestrey limestone is visible, and there Cerotiocaris 
 Encrinurus punctatus, Lichas Bucklandii, and Proetus 
 Stokesii have been obtained ; and at the northern end of 
 Whitcliff is a fine Upper Ludlow quarry, containing many 
 interesting fossils. Along the Wigmore road are a number 
 of small quarries of Aymestrey and Lower Ludlow, which 
 latter is largely exposed in the Sunny Gutter below Mary 
 Knowl, and in the roads about Burrington the Wenlock 
 shale is easily accessible, also in the river-bed above there, 
 where Phacops longicaudatus is numerous. Within the 
 Burrington end of the Downton gorge are high cliffs of 
 Aymestrey, and in one place a series from Downton sand- 
 stone to Lower Ludlow. Lower down, near the Castle 
 Bridge, the Ludlow Bone Bed is accessible in the river bank. 
 The Tin Mill Race and the banks near Forge Bridge, still 
 lower, should also be visited for fine sections of Downton 
 sandstone. 
 
 In the roads to the west of Ludlow masses of Pentamerus 
 Knightii are common in the piles of road-metal. These 
 come from the quarries at Leintwardine, where at Mocktree 
 Hill is a grand section of Lower Ludlow and Aymestrey r 
 with vast quantities of this fossil in very perfect condition r 
 besides specimens of the Star Fish, Protaster Leptosoma and 
 vermiformis, Ceratiocaris, Crinoids, Pterygotus, &c. There 
 are also Phragmoceras ventricosum, arcnatum, and com- 
 pressum, Favorites alveolaris, Litnites giganteus, Orthoceras 
 saturni, ibex, and Mocktreense, Cyrtoceras extricatitm, 
 Lingula lata, Phacops caudatus, Cardiola striata, besides 
 many others of commoner occurrence. In quarries on 
 Church Hill, close to the village, the Lower Ludlow is very 
 prolific in fossils of many different kinds Star Fish, En- 
 crinites, Trilobites, of which the following are a few : 
 Protaster Miltoni, Leptosoma, and vermiformis, Mono- 
 graptus chimoera, Leintwardinensis clavicula, and Nilssoni, 
 Scaphaspis Ludensis, Paloeocoma Marstoni and Colvini, 
 Sphoeraster pomum, Pteraspis Ludensis, Limuloides optatus, 
 Pterygotus punctatus, Phacops Stokesii, Calymene tubercu- 
 losa, &c., &c. Several of the quarries are now filled up, 
 and the rock is no longer accessible, but one remains near 
 Trippleton Farm, and is still productive. 
 
 OLD RED SANDSTONE. The Transition beds between 
 the Silurian and Old Red Sandstone can be studied in 
 several places near the town. They are well exposed at
 
 GEOLOGY OF THE NEIGHBOURHOOD. 167 
 
 the south end of the railway tunnel at a quarry between 
 Onibury and Norton, where Pterygotus and Eurypterus are 
 iound in the yellow Downton sandstone ; also the mica- 
 ceous shales near the Tin Mills at Downton. These Tin 
 Mill shales occur on the right bank of the river, about half 
 a mile below the town, where Cephalaspis Murchisonii, 
 Lingula cornea, &c., also ; at a footbridge over the Led- 
 wyche under Caynham Camp, where Berychia, Leperditia 
 marginata, &c., are obtainable. 
 
 At a quarry at Whitbatch, within two miles of Ludlow, 
 the Old Red Sandstone and the calcareous rock called corn- 
 stone which occurs in it, and in which its organic remains 
 are chiefly found, are both well exposed. In a quarry 
 higher up on the right fragments of fossil fish, Cephalaspis 
 Lyelli, were found by Mr. Alfred Marston ; and in several 
 places further up Corve Dale, notably at Hayton's Bent 
 and Bouldon, the same collector found other species of 
 Cephalaspis and Pteraspis, especially at the latter place. 
 At Hill Halton, to the west of the town, near Oakly Park, 
 Mr. Alfred Marston has also found organic remains in the 
 marly beds which underlie the cornstones. 
 
 CARBONIFEROUS LIMESTONE. The carboniferous lime- 
 stone is developed on the north and south of the Titterstone 
 Clee mountain, which appears to owe its elevation both to 
 volcanic upheaval, to which the basalt on its summit seems 
 to testify, and to denudation, which has carried away the 
 -softer surrounding portions, and left the mountain limestone 
 and Millstone Grit high above the neighbouring Old Red. 
 On the side towards Cleobury Mortimer is the most instruc- 
 tive series, where one ascends from the yellow upper beds 
 of the Old Red Sandstone to the carboniferous shales and 
 limestones, and afterwards Millstone Grit ; then the Coal 
 Measures, and finally the basalt on the summit. 
 
 On the shoulder of the hill are many disused coalpits, in 
 the shale from which fossil ferns are found, and on the sides 
 of the Batch Valley are many exposures of the Coal Measures. 
 The carboniferous limestone is quarried on a large scale for 
 lime-burning at the Knowl Hill buttress of Titterstone, and 
 there are large excavations in the basalt on the upper part 
 -called Hoar Edge, where the quarries show a wall of rock 
 145 feet high ; but the columnar shape of the latter rock is 
 best seen in the untouched part, near the highest peak, of 
 which the Giant's Chair is a part.
 
 i68 
 
 LUDLOW TOWN AND NEIGHBOURHOOD. 
 
 The above account is, from the nature of the work, a 
 very condensed one, and those who wish to follow up the 
 subject will do well to obtain the Handbook to Shropshire 
 Geology by the Rev. J. D. La Touche (Adnitt and Naunton, 
 Shrewsbury), which deals with it in a masterly and ex- 
 haustive manner. 
 
 PENTAMERUS KNIGHTII.
 
 Woolley's Ludlow Publications. 
 
 Third Edition. Crown 8vo. 5/- net. 
 
 Ludlow Town and Neighbourhood. 
 
 By Mr. Oliver Baker, Fellow of the Royal Society of Painter- 
 Etchers (London) ; Member of the Royal Society of Artists 
 (Birmingham). With about 70 Illustrations in fac-simile, 
 produced by the Typographic Etching Company, of London, 
 from Original Sketches by the Author. 
 
 New Edition (the Twelfth) with Eleven additional beautiful Illustrations 
 
 and Plan of the Castle. Price 6d. post-free Sd. ; 
 
 Cloth i/ post-free 1/2. 
 
 Woolley's Guide to Ludlow Castle and Church. 
 
 Giving a Historical and Descriptive Sketch of the Castle and 
 Church of St. Lawrence, Ludlow. By Thomas Wright, Esq., 
 M.A., F.S.A. To which is added An Account of the Ancient 
 Monuments in the Church, and A Walk Through the Town. 
 By Oliver Baker, Esq. 
 
 Crown Bvo. 26 pp. Price $d. 
 
 Guide to Stokesay Castle. 
 
 A Historical Sketch. By the late Thomas Wright, M.A., F.S.A. 
 
 SPECIAL OFFER ? Demy Svo. Cloth. 541 pp. Reduced to 6/- 
 
 post-free, or in the folded sheets (unbound) S/-. Originally 
 
 published at i6/-. 
 
 Wright's History of Ludlow & the Welsh Border. 
 
 Forming a popular Sketch of the History of Ludlow and the 
 Welsh Border. By the late Thomas Wright, Esq., M.A., 
 F.S.A., Hon. M.R.S.L. 
 
 G.W. having purchased tne whole of the remaining copies of the 
 original work, published In 1852, now offers them at the low price of 6'-, 
 to give everyone who feels any interest in the History of Ludlow, the 
 Lord Marchers and the Welsh Border, an opportunity of obtaining a 
 copy of this very valuable work. 
 
 Just published. Demy Bvo. 32 pp. Price (/- ; per Post, 1/2. 
 
 The Glass in the Parish Church of Ludlow, 
 
 with important Illustrations from original MS. By Henry 
 T. Weyman, F.S.A. 
 
 Quarto. Gilt Edges. Price 7/6. 
 
 The Parish Church of St. Lawrence, Ludlow. 
 
 A Monograph of the Tower Restoration, 1889 90 91. 
 With Eleven Full-page Illustrations. A most important Work 
 on the Restoration of our Parish Church. A few copies left. 
 
 GEORGE WOOLLEY, Publisher, LUDLOW.
 
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